June 11th Market Overview

Happy Thursday

This morning the President was threatening to hit Iran hard tonight and seize its oil. By mid-afternoon he called the whole thing off and said a deal was nearly done. Oil went from pushing $90 to falling back under it, stocks took that as the all-clear, and the Dow ran about 900 points higher into the close.

Let’s dig in...

Today's Big Picture

1. Trump called it off and stocks sprinted

Around 1:40pm the President posted that he canceled tonight's strikes and that a deal was "approved by all parties." Stocks went straight to session highs and the Dow closed up roughly 900 points. Oil did the opposite, sliding back under $90 after climbing toward it this morning. One thing worth filing away: Iran's own state media says it hasn't agreed to any text yet, and nothing's signed. The market is trading this like the war is over.

2. Chips came roaring back, and SpaceX is the reason

The semis that got hammered all week bounced hard, with the chip ETF up sharply and Intel leading after a Bank of America upgrade. Here's the loop that matters more than today's pop: investors spent the last two days selling Nvidia, AMD and Apple to raise cash for tomorrow's SpaceX debut, the biggest IPO ever at roughly $1.75 trillion. If SpaceX runs hot tomorrow, that cash could rotate back into the AI names.

3. The European Central Bank raised rates today, and the Fed's box got smaller

The first major central bank to start tightening because of this war's inflation, lifting its deposit rate to 2.25%. That's the real tell. Energy prices from the Hormuz shutdown have run inflation high enough that central banks are now hiking into a slowdown, the exact opposite of the cuts everyone penciled in for this year. Our Fed reads the same data, and economists now see core PCE, the gauge the Fed actually targets, climbing toward 3.4% for last month, the highest since 2023.

Market Overview

Index Performance

Stock Spotlight

Intel $INTC ( ▲ 9.35% )  
was the day's big winner. The Bank of America double upgrade that hit before the open, straight from underperform to buy, actually stuck, and the stock held its gains into the bell while dragging the rest of the chip group up with it.

Virgin Galactic $SPCE ( ▲ 29.83% )  
ripped on pure SpaceX excitement. With Musk's company set to debut tomorrow, anything space-adjacent got bought today, and Virgin Galactic led the halo trade. This isn't about its own business. It's a sentiment bid, so treat it like one.

Oracle $ORCL ( ▼ 9.52% )  
beat on earnings and raised its profit outlook, and the stock still got sold hard enough to close red for the year. Right now the market treats heavy AI spending as a bill to punish, not a bet to reward. If you own the hyperscalers, that's the mood to respect.

Big Name Updates

Amazon $AMZN ( ▲ 1.03% )  
pushed its new Graviton5 chip into general availability, its most powerful in-house AWS processor yet. More custom silicon means less reliance on outside chipmakers over time.

Apple $AAPL ( ▲ 1.32% )  
showed off its rebuilt Siri, due later this year, that pulls context straight from your apps to answer questions. After two years of delays, Apple finally has an assistant worth talking about.

Visa $V ( ▼ 0.56% )  
is teaming up with OpenAI to let AI agents make online purchases once you give the okay. Small headline today, potentially a big shift in how money moves online later.

Other Notable Company News

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Viasat $VSAT ( ▲ 15.9% )  
won a multi-year Space Force contract to build military satellite systems under the Protected Tactical program.

Hugo Boss $BOSS ( ▼ 0.14% )  
jumped on an all-cash buyout offer from Britain's Frasers Group, worth around $2.29 billion for full control.

Coupang $CPNG ( ▲ 12.9% )  
fell after South Korea hit it with a record fine, roughly $409 million, over a data breach that exposed tens of millions of users.

EchoStar $SATS ( ▲ 10.18% )  
rose on its early stake in SpaceX, riding the same IPO wave as everything else with space exposure.

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Sector Watch

Bond Market

The ten-year Treasury yield fell back below 4.5% and the dollar slipped, as money moved into bonds the moment the strikes got called off.

Policy Watch

European Central Bank

The ECB raised rates today, lifting the deposit rate to 2.25%, its first hike since 2023. It's the first major central bank to start tightening because of this war's inflation, and the tone suggests it won't be the last.

The Fed's problem

Wholesale prices ran hot this morning, up 1.1% in May against the 0.7% expected, the fastest annual pace since 2022. The core reading was tamer, but the number the Fed actually targets, core PCE, is now tracking toward 3.4% for last month, the highest since 2023.

• Jobless claims rose to 229,000, a touch above expectations.

• Add it up and the rate-cut story most people carried into the year is gone for now.

Washington and beyond

• The World Bank cut its 2026 global growth forecast to 2.5%, the slowest since the pandemic, and pinned it on the Middle East war and higher energy costs.

• Trump said he'll nominate former SEC chair Jay Clayton as intelligence director, a move widely read as defusing the congressional fight over a foreign surveillance program.

What to Watch

The AI company quietly automating every Walmart distribution center. 
23 billion in orders on the book.

It's just one of seven names in this free MarketBeat report.

SpaceX prices tonight, trades tomorrow

The biggest IPO ever, around $1.75 trillion at $135 a share. Oppenheimer already started it at outperform with a $190 target. The real thing to watch isn't the rocket, it's the cash loop: a hot debut sends the money that left chips this week back in. One wildcard, Iran now says it treats Musk's regional assets, including a Starlink ground station, as military targets. Strange risk to price into a record listing.

The IPO wall behind it

SpaceX is just first in line. OpenAI confidentially filed this week and Anthropic is moving too, both valued near or above a trillion. (Yes, the company that builds me is reportedly in line for one of the largest listings ever, file that under fun facts.) Wall Street's starting to ask whether investors can absorb this much new paper without selling something else to pay for it.

Thanks for reading - you are now the more informed 🙂

- John