Middle East Uncertainty Keeps Markets on Edge 28/09/2026
Market Wrap
U.S. stocks rose Friday, ending a volatile week on a positive note despite Treasury yields remaining near multiyear highs.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 479 points, or 0.93%, while the S&P 500 climbed 0.51% and the Nasdaq Composite added 0.5%. Akamai Technologies (AKAM) gained 3% after announcing a multiyear deal with Anthropic, while Meta Platforms (META) surged nearly 13% for the week amid enthusiasm around its Muse AI agent.
Oil prices fell Friday on hopes that diplomatic efforts could lead to the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, helping ease some inflation concerns. For the week, the Dow gained 0.3%, the S&P 500 rose 1.2% and the Nasdaq advanced 2%.
But geopolitical risk returned over the weekend. Stock futures moved lower early Monday as oil prices jumped following reports that President Donald Trump rejected an Iranian proposal aimed at ending the conflict and reopening the Strait of Hormuz. Brent crude climbed above $107 a barrel, while U.S. crude traded above $94.
Elevated Treasury yields also remain a key risk for equities, particularly high-growth technology and AI stocks whose valuations can be more sensitive to higher interest rates. Recent Fed commentary has kept inflation and the possibility of additional tightening firmly in focus.
This week's attention turns to the labor market, PCE inflation and GDP data, while Monday's focus will be on remarks from Federal Reserve officials as investors look for further clues on the path of interest rates.
U.S.-China AI Rivalry Is Becoming a Battle of Different Strategies
The artificial-intelligence competition between the U.S. and China is increasingly becoming a contest between two very different development strategies rather than a simple race for the most powerful model.
U.S. AI companies have benefited from abundant capital and computing power, allowing labs to focus on scaling increasingly powerful frontier models. China, constrained by limited access to advanced chips, has instead emphasized efficiency, lower-cost deployment and open-weight models that developers can modify and run themselves.
That strategy has helped Chinese AI models gain broader international adoption, but computing power remains a significant constraint. Chinese companies have faced capacity shortages, outages and delays when attempting to deploy new models to large numbers of users.
U.S. restrictions on advanced semiconductor exports have reinforced China's push to develop domestic alternatives and reduce its dependence on American technology. At the same time, companies such as DeepSeek have demonstrated that competitive AI systems can be developed with more limited computing resources.
The result is an AI landscape with no obvious finish line: the U.S. maintains an advantage in frontier computing power, while China is building around efficiency, open models and large-scale practical deployment.
Stocks on the Move
- Akamai Technologies (AKAM): Shares gained 5% after the cloud-computing company announced a seven-year, $11.6 billion agreement with Anthropic. Akamai also issued a warrant allowing Anthropic to acquire up to roughly 5% of the company at $111.33 per share.
- Atlas Energy Solutions (AESI): Shares surged 17% after the energy and logistics company said two subsidiaries signed cost-reimbursement agreements with a leading frontier AI lab.
- Genius Sports (GENI): Shares jumped 13% after JPMorgan initiated coverage with an overweight rating, citing strong growth, improving profitability and free cash flow, and an attractive valuation.
- Twilio (TWLO): Shares fell about 6% after HSBC downgraded the cloud platform provider to a sell-equivalent rating, citing an unfavorable risk-reward profile following the stock's recent rally and a relatively expensive valuation.
Watchlist: XOM, CVX, MSTR, AAPL, TSLA, META, MU, AMD, CRWD, AKAM, KNDI, ADXN
Key Economic Events Today
Economic Data (EST)
- 08:15 AM — USD FOMC Member Bowman Speaks
- 01:25 PM — USD FOMC Member Cook Speaks
- 01:30 PM — USD FOMC Member Barkin Speaks
Earnings
Before Market Open: Kandi Technologies (KNDI), Genius Group (GNS), Addex Therapeutics (ADXN)
After Market Close: Jeffries Financial Group (JEF), Vail Resorts (MTN)
