Thirteen Days of Greed.
The Nasdaq's longest winning streak since 1992 crowned a week of records. Saturday, Iranian gunboats reopened the conversation.
Published 2026-04-19
What Moved This Week
The Rally
Thirteen consecutive up sessions on the Nasdaq Composite. The longest streak since January 9, 1992. Over that stretch, the index gained 17.7%. On Friday alone, the Nasdaq posted a third straight record close, the S&P 500 added 1.20% to close at a fresh all-time high above 7,125, and the Dow jumped 850 points.
The S&P's weekly gain reached 4.4%, its third straight higher week. Measured from the April 1 low, the index had recovered its entire March drawdown and pushed to a fresh all-time high.
By the Friday close, the S&P 500, the Nasdaq Composite, and the Nasdaq 100 had all set records in the same session. The backdrop was a US naval blockade of the Strait of Hormuz.
The Catalyst
Friday morning, Iran's foreign minister announced that the Strait of Hormuz was "fully open and ready for full passage." Trump said a peace deal with Iran was "very close." The US blockade remained in place, but CENTCOM had signaled a diplomatic off-ramp on Wednesday when it described the blockade as "fully implemented."
Oil repriced in a straight line. WTI's May futures closed down nearly 12% at $83.85 in New York. On the StoicFX platform, USOIL settled at $86.87, down 9.3% on the week. UKOIL held better at $92.97, a 3.6% weekly drop.
The Banks
Four balance sheets, four records.
Goldman Sachs posted Q1 EPS of $17.55 on revenue of $17.23 billion, with equities trading at an all-time record and ROE at 19.8%. JPMorgan earned $5.94 per share on $50.54 billion of revenue, with investment banking fees up 28% and credit provisions at only $2.5 billion. Bank of America beat at $1.11 EPS on $30.3 billion of revenue, ending the quarter with a record 38.5 million consumer checking accounts. Morgan Stanley printed record Q1 revenue of $20.6 billion, EPS of $3.43, and equities trading of $5.15 billion, a 25% jump.
Wartime volatility did not damage the books. It produced record-setting trading revenue across the major US banks.
The Inflation Pipeline
Tuesday's March PPI arrived hot. Final demand rose 0.5% month-over-month and 4.0% year-over-year, the largest twelve-month advance since February 2023. Final demand goods jumped 1.6% in a single month, the biggest since August 2023. Gasoline alone rose 15.7%. Services were unchanged.
The regional surveys echoed the pressure. Empire State Manufacturing flipped positive to 11.0 from March's -0.2, with new orders and shipments at their highest levels since 2023. The prices paid component climbed from 36.6 to 51.0. Philadelphia Fed expanded to 26.7, up 8.6 points and the highest since January 2025.
Regional activity firming. Prices paid surging in both surveys. Headline PPI at a three-year high. The Fed's job has not gotten easier.
The IMF's Shadow
On Tuesday the IMF published its April World Economic Outlook under the title "Global Economy in the Shadow of War." Base case: 3.1% global growth in 2026, well below the 3.7% historical average. An adverse scenario with a sharper energy shock drops growth to 2.5% and raises inflation to 5.4%. A severe scenario with dislocation extending into 2027 cuts growth to 2.0% and pushes inflation above 6%.
The base case assumed a limited conflict. The Spring Meetings closed Friday.
China Q1
Thursday brought China's Q1 GDP at 5.0% year-over-year, beating expectations. Industrial production accelerated to 6.1%, with equipment manufacturing at 8.9% and high-tech manufacturing at 12.5%. Retail sales lagged at 2.4%, where internal demand remains the question. Combined imports and exports grew 15%.
The print eased one of the two overhangs on global growth. Oil was the other.
Forex
EUR/USD closed at 1.17622, up 84 pips on the week. Cheaper oil helps a net energy importer disproportionately.
GBP/USD settled at 1.35161, up 110 pips, on a similar energy story and ongoing hawkish BoE repricing.
USD/JPY fell to 158.60, down 94 pips on the week. The 160 intervention wall held, not because Tokyo intervened, but because the dollar weakened first. The Bank of Japan meets April 27-28 with markets pricing a 69% probability of a hike from 0.75% to 1.00%. The FOMC follows on April 28-29, and the ECB wraps the cluster on April 29-30.
DXY closed near 98, down about 0.5% on the week, its third consecutive weekly decline.
Gold and Silver
Gold closed at $4,833 on the StoicFX platform, a $84 gain or 1.77% on the week. A fourth straight weekly advance, built while oil was crashing.
Silver outperformed at $80.79, up 6.5%. Gold's safe-haven bid plus an industrial response to China's Q1 print.
Crypto
Bitcoin at $75,946, up 6.6% on the week and its highest open since February 4. Ethereum at $2,334, up 5.9%. Both assets participated in the broad risk-on move, with BTC recovering the prior week's ceasefire bid and extending.
The Weekend
Friday's rally was built on the reopening of the Strait. Saturday, it closed again.
Iran's joint military command said control of the Strait had "returned to its previous state." Revolutionary Guard gunboats opened fire on two Indian-flagged vessels in the waterway. One was the motor tanker Sanmar Herald. The other was a container ship. Audio from the Sanmar Herald captured the crew pleading as shots were fired. One of the ships had been given clearance to enter the Strait minutes before it came under fire.
India summoned Iran's ambassador. Trump said the US blockade remains "in full force until the transaction is complete." Pakistan began arranging a further round of talks.
The S&P set a record on Friday. The next morning, Iranian gunboats were firing on tankers in the waterway that Friday's rally was built on.
Key Moves
climbed 4.4% on the week to a third straight record close
rallied with the Composite's thirteen-session streak, the longest winning run since January 1992
jumped 850 points Friday as the broader equity record extended
fell 9.3% on the week after Iran reopened Hormuz Friday and then closed it Saturday
dropped 3.6%, narrower decline than WTI as physical cargoes stayed bid versus paper
gained 1.77% in a fourth straight weekly advance even as risk assets rallied
climbed 6.5% on the week, outpaced gold on combined safe-haven and industrial bid
climbed 84 pips as cheaper oil eased the eurozone import bill
rose 110 pips on dollar weakness and hawkish BoE repricing
fell 94 pips as the dollar weakened before the April BOJ and FOMC meetings
climbed 6.6% to its highest open since February 4
rose 5.9% alongside bitcoin on the broad risk-on move
Week Ahead
Monday prices Saturday. Equity futures, oil, gold, and the yen all face the same question: how much of Friday's rally was real, and how much was positioning on a narrative that reversed inside of a weekend.
Forex priced the Hormuz reopening on Friday. Monday prices its closure and the tanker fire that followed.
The central bank cluster is now the dominant overhang. The Bank of Japan meets April 27-28 with markets pricing a 69% probability of a hike from 0.75% to 1.00%. The FOMC follows April 28-29, with March CPI at 3.3%, March PPI at 4.0%, and a prices-paid surge in both regional manufacturing surveys to weigh. The ECB closes the cluster April 29-30.
This week's data calendar is lighter than last week's. US and European flash PMIs, along with fresh housing data, will show whether the manufacturing strength from the New York and Philadelphia Fed surveys extended into late April and how the oil shock filtered into residential activity.
Tech earnings begin the next wave, with megacap reports scheduled across the final week of April. Initial guidance will be issued into a quarter whose backdrop has shifted twice in a month. Industrial and transport names report this week, offering the first reads on how Q1 margins held up under the oil shock. Every company reporting this week priced Q2 guidance before Saturday's tanker attacks. The post-reversal version of those guides will not appear for another quarter.
Traders watch the Strait of Hormuz shipping data for real-time confirmation of whether traffic resumed after the Saturday incident or stayed suspended.
Instrument Spotlight
The S&P 500 closed Friday at 7,125.45 on the StoicFX platform, 7,126.06 on the cash index. A fresh all-time high. The third consecutive weekly gain. The US Navy was enforcing a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz at the moment the record was printed.
None of that showed up in price.
Where the Record Came From
The rally was built across thirteen consecutive up sessions on the Nasdaq Composite. Measured from the April 1 close to Friday's finish, the Nasdaq gained 17.7%. The streak was the longest since January 9, 1992, before the dot-com rally had begun. The S&P 500 over the same stretch recovered its March drawdown and closed Friday at a fresh record.
Three inputs aligned for institutional buying.
The first was Friday's Hormuz reopening, which compressed the geopolitical risk premium that had been building since February. The second was Q1 bank earnings, which showed that wartime volatility produced record trading revenue rather than credit damage. The third was China's Q1 GDP print of 5.0%, which eased the second-largest overhang on global growth.
None of the three were guarantees. They were data points. The market treated them as a resolution.
The Rare Streak
Thirteen-session winning streaks on the Nasdaq are rare. Since 1980, only a handful of runs have reached this length. Historical streaks of this magnitude have produced a wide range of subsequent outcomes, from multi-year continuations to sharp reversals within weeks of the final session.
What made this streak different is that each individual session was relatively contained. The headline came from the thirteen consecutive closes, not from the size of any single move. No comparable run had emerged on the Nasdaq in the thirty-four years between January 1992 and this streak. That is rare. The rarity is descriptive, not predictive.
What the Record Prices
The S&P's all-time high at 7,125 reflects a market that believes three things simultaneously: that the Middle Eastern conflict is de-escalating, that inflation is manageable, and that earnings growth can continue into Q2.
The first belief reversed on Saturday when Iran re-closed the Strait and IRGC gunboats fired on two Indian-flagged vessels. The second is being tested by a 4.0% PPI print and a prices-paid surge in both regional surveys. The third will be tested over the next three weeks as megacap tech reports.
What Monday Tests
Monday is not a test of the record itself. Records are set. The test is whether the narrative that produced the record survived the weekend. The specific question: does the market treat Iranian gunboats firing on tankers as a pause in a peace process or the end of one? Equity futures begin answering the question on Sunday night. The opening candle on Monday morning converts that answer into a price.
Trading Insight: Why Streaks Are Not Signals
A winning streak is a pattern. Patterns compress information. The compression is useful right up until it becomes a signal.
The Nasdaq's thirteen-session run looked like conviction. Some of it probably was. But streaks of this length are built on a specific arithmetic: each day's buyers need to outnumber each day's sellers by enough to close the index above the prior close. That is a constraint on the behavior of a single day. It is not a constraint on what the accumulated behavior means.
The Thin Edge
Individual sessions were contained. The streak's headline came from the thirteen consecutive closes, not from the size of any session. Runs this long are historically rare: the most recent precedent was a Nasdaq streak that ended in January 1992. That is rare. The rarity is descriptive, not predictive.
What Streaks Reflect
Streaks emerge when sellers have exhausted themselves and dip-buyers find themselves competing only with each other. The April 1 low emerged after weeks of selling pressure. Positioning was light. Options were skewed to the downside. Under those conditions, almost any positive catalyst can produce a streak.
What the streak does not tell you: whether the catalyst was durable. Long streaks in history have produced a wide range of subsequent outcomes, from multi-year continuations to reversals within weeks of the final session. The streak itself does not discriminate between the two.
What Matters
The discriminator is the news that produces the next move. A streak off a cyclical bottom, supported by improving fundamentals and a durable catalyst, tends to extend. A streak off a headline that reverses within 48 hours is more fragile.
Saturday's tanker fire does not prove that the streak was wrong. It proves that the catalyst for the streak, the Hormuz reopening, may not have been as stable as the Friday rally implied. The market's treatment of the weekend news as signal or noise will show in Monday's first two hours of trade.
Stoic Reflection
“Men are disturbed not by the things which happen, but by the opinions about the things.”
— Epictetus
The market made money this week on an opinion about a blockade, not the blockade itself.
The blockade did not lift on Friday. US naval forces remained in position. Tanker traffic through the Strait had already collapsed to a fraction of its normal volume. What changed Friday was an announcement and an interpretation: Iran said the Strait was fully open; the market said peace was imminent. The S&P rallied on the interpretation.
Epictetus is not claiming events are neutral. Events have real effects: tankers under fire, crude prices repricing, families grieving. His observation is narrower. Our distress, or in this market's case our euphoria, responds not to the event itself but to the opinion we form about it. Change the opinion, the response changes, even if the event is unchanged.
Friday's event was an announcement. The opinion the market formed was that peace was imminent. Saturday, Iranian gunboats fired on two Indian-flagged tankers in the same waterway. The same naval posture, the same blockade, the same disputed Strait, reinterpreted overnight.
Traders who priced the opinion were exposed when it reversed. Traders who priced the fact that a blockade is still a blockade until a treaty is signed were not.
The weekly record was real. So is what produced it. Both can be true, and both usually are. The difference between them is where the work is.
Questions Traders Are Asking
What does it mean when the S&P 500 hits an all-time high during a geopolitical crisis?
Equity markets price the expected future cash flows of underlying businesses, discounted for the rate environment and adjusted for risk. When a geopolitical event threatens those cash flows, prices fall. When the threat is perceived to be resolving, prices recover. The S&P 500's April 17 record close at 7,125.45 reflected three simultaneous developments: Iran's announcement that the Strait of Hormuz was fully open, Q1 bank earnings showing that wartime volatility had produced record trading revenue rather than credit damage, and China's Q1 GDP beating forecasts at 5.0%. The all-time high did not mean the crisis was over. US naval forces remained at Hormuz, the blockade was still in force, and tankers were still rerouting. It meant the market had repriced the probability of prolonged disruption. When that probability reversed on Saturday with fresh Iranian gunboat fire on Indian-flagged vessels, the equity rally faced a direct test at Monday's open.
Why did oil prices drop more than equities rose during the week?
Oil prices are more sensitive to single-day geopolitical headlines than equity indices because oil is a physical commodity with a direct supply chain that includes the Strait of Hormuz. On Friday, April 17, WTI fell nearly 12% on the futures close and Brent fell 9% on news of the Strait reopening. Across the full week, USOIL on the StoicFX platform fell 9.3% and UKOIL fell 3.6%. Equity markets benefit only indirectly from lower oil through lower input costs, reduced inflation pressure, and improved consumer spending. That indirect benefit is spread across many sectors and many quarters, so even large oil moves translate into smaller single-day equity moves. The asymmetry is structural: oil is one input in a complex system, while any single geopolitical headline is the most important input to the price of oil for that session.
What does a thirteen-session winning streak on the Nasdaq historically mean?
The Nasdaq Composite's thirteen-day streak through April 17, 2026, was its longest since January 9, 1992, meaning no comparable run had occurred in the thirty-four intervening years. Over the thirteen sessions, the Nasdaq gained 17.7%. Streaks of this length tend to emerge near cyclical bottoms when sellers have exhausted themselves and positioning is light. Historically, long streaks have been followed by a wide range of outcomes, from continued multi-year rallies to sharp reversals within weeks. The streak itself is descriptive, not predictive. It tells you what happened. It does not tell you whether the catalyst behind it was durable. In this case, the catalyst was the perception that the Middle Eastern conflict was de-escalating. Saturday's reversal of the Hormuz reopening and the firing on two Indian-flagged tankers provided an immediate test of that catalyst at Monday's open.
Disclaimer
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