After the historic rally since the start of the quarter most major indices spent last week consolidating. The S&P 500 traded in a ~1.5% range, ending modestly higher with technology doing most of the heavy lifting. The NYSE 100 index was up >2% but the Semiconductor index, which entered the weekend on an 18-session win streak, was the star of the show up >10% for the week and 50% YTD.

Iran news during the weekend was somewhat quiet and overshadowed by the shooting at the White House Correspondents’ dinner, which thankfully was stopped before anything truly terrible happened. One of the main reasons for the quietness was because President Trump didn’t send negotiators to Pakistan for another round of talks, though he added that talks didn’t have to take place in person. Axios and others then reported that the Administration is mulling over a new proposal from Iran, which includes reopening the Strait and lifting the US blockade, while negotiations on Iran’s nuclear program would come later.

Oil prices are back near the pre-ceasefire highs however; equity markets have taken the weekend’s news in stride ahead of a week chock full of catalysts. This week the world’s major central banks all have rate decisions including what could be Fed Chair Powell’s last on Wednesday. This week is also the peak of earnings season in the US, at least as measured by market capitalization, with >40% of the S&P 500 reporting this week including the hyperscalers on Wednesday evening. As we highlighted in Friday’s recap, earnings have been strong with >80% of companies in the S&P 500 beating both EPS and revenue estimates.