Explosions heard in the sky over Doha, Qatar. Here's what we know
CNBC's Megan Cassella joins 'Halftime Report' to report on the latest from the Israel-Iran conflict.
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Yahoo
19 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Middle East tensions could unleash a 2-part worst-case scenario that hits stocks, Morgan Stanley says
The worst-case scenario for stocks could come out of tensions between Israel and Iran, Morgan Stanley said. The bank said its bear case for stocks was oil prices spiking near the end of the business cycle. Oil prices climbed in the heat of the Israel-Iran conflict, but have cooled after the cease-fire. Tensions in the Middle East could spark a series of dire developments for the stock market, strategists at Morgan Stanley said this week. In a note to clients, the bank pointed to the conflict that's unfolded between Israel, Iran, and the US over the last 12 days, with Israel and Iran agreeing to a cease-fire on Monday. Tensions, though, contributed to a spike in oil prices in the last week. While crude is back down, a big jump higher in oil stemming from any Middle East conflict is something that could raise the risk of a recession and lead to the most pessimistic outcome for stocks, the bank said. "The bear case scenario for equities tied to the recent events in the Middle East would be that oil prices rise significantly, thereby posing a threat to the business cycle," strategists wrote. Morgan Stanley's bear-case scenario has two parts that "materially" raise the risks posed to markets, the note said. Oil prices rise at least 75% on a year-over-year basis. That implies Brent crude trading around or over the $120 per barrel range, strategists said. In order for oil prices to trade that high, it would probably require "sustained" disruption to oil supply in the Strait of Hormuz, they added, a key passage for oil exporters in the Middle East. Crude prices dropped significantly from their highs last year, and have also cooled from their recent spike after Iran's limited retaliatory strike on a US base in Qatar and the subsequent cease-fire with Israel. Brent crude, which rose as much as 14% during the 12 days of the conflict, traded around $66 a barrel on Tuesday. The international benchmark was down 20% from last year's levels. West Texas Intermediate crude, which rose as much as 10%, traded around $66 a barrel, down 18% year-over-year. The oil spike needs to occur late in the business cycle. Oil price spikes that have occurred late in the business cycle have historically led to recessions, according to Morgan Stanley's analysis. To be sure, while Morgan Stanley sees spiraling oil prices as highly negative for markets and the economy, such a scenario isn't analysts' base case. "Through last week, the year-over-year rate of change on crude was negative. Thus, while we're respectful of the risks, there's a long way to go on this basis," strategists wrote. The bank remains positive on stocks overall. While geopolitical events have historically sparked volatility in equities, the S&P 500 rose an average of 9% in the 12 months following major conflicts dating back to 1950, according to Morgan Stanley's analysis. Prior to the cease-fire, other Wall Street forecasters were eyeing the risk of a more dramatic oil price spike and its potential effects on the US economy. On Monday, JPMorgan analysts said they saw oil prices rising as high as $130 a barrel if conflict between Israel and Iran were to disrupt energy production in the Persian Gulf. Torsten Sløk, the chief economist at Apollo Global Management, said he saw rising oil prices contributing to stagflation, a scenario where the economy slows while inflation remains stubbornly high. "In short, higher oil prices exacerbate the ongoing stagflation shock stemming from tariffs and immigration restrictions," Sløk wrote in a June note to clients. Read the original article on Business Insider
Yahoo
25 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trump Baffles With Sudden U-Turn on China Buying Iranian Oil
(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump on Tuesday appeared to undermine years of US sanctions on Iran, giving its biggest customer China the green light to carry on buying its oil as he seeks to bolster a ceasefire with Israel. Bezos Wedding Draws Protests, Soul-Searching Over Tourism in Venice US State Budget Wounds Intensify From Trump, DOGE Policy Shifts US Renters Face Storm of Rising Costs Commuters Are Caught in Johannesburg's Taxi Feuds as Transit Lags The announcement on social media — which surprised both oil traders and officials in his own government — could undermine the central element of Washington's Iran policy under multiple administrations, which have sought to cut the regime's main source of revenue by making its top export off limits. 'China can now continue to purchase oil from Iran,' the president said on Truth Social, amid a flurry of posts demanding Israel and Iran cease hostilities. The statement landed only hours after Trump declared the Middle East rivals had agreed to a ceasefire, which got off to a shaky start with early breaches by both sides. It follows massive US airstrikes on several of the Islamic Republic's nuclear facilities Sunday, an offensive aimed at stopping Tehran from obtaining an atomic weapon. Oil prices extended losses after Trump's comments, with West Texas Intermediate futures sinking 6% to settle near $64 a barrel in New York. The market had already plunged in recent days as the threat to oil flows from the Israel-Iran conflict faded. US Treasury and State department officials handling Iranian oil sanctions were surprised by Trump's statement and uncertain how to immediately interpret it, according to people familiar with the situation. In the meantime, however, Treasury will continue to strictly enforce related sanctions, said one of the people, who asked not to be identified given the political and market sensitivity of the issue. Treasury Department didn't immediately respond to requests for comment, while the State Department referred questions to the White House. A senior White House official later signaled that sanctions would remain, saying that the president continues to call on China and others to import American oil rather than Iranian, which would be a violation of US sanctions. The official added that Trump's post was only intended to highlight that his actions over the past several days ensured that the Straits of Hormuz was not impacted, which the official said would have been devastating for China. Tammy Bruce, State Department spokeswoman, declined to provide further specifics during a briefing Tuesday. 'I'm not going to get ahead of the president or try to guess what his strategy will be,' she said when asked about the comment. 'Things happen quickly and I think we'll find out sooner than later.' The apparent shift also comes as the Trump administration seeks to hammer out a new trade framework with China and climb down from a tariff war that saw duties reach levels high enough to cut all trade between the world's two biggest economies. The comments appeared to be Trump 'throwing a bone' to China and Iran for cooperating in their respective talks with the US, said Mark Malek, chief investment officer at Siebert. 'Most of us are thinking that it's just rhetoric at this point. But it definitely took me by surprise.' Allowing a specific carve out for China may be an effort by Trump to send positive signals to Beijing as he seeks a new tariff deal, said a person familiar with the president's thinking, also asking not to be identified. While the potential shift may ease some legal risks around China's buying of Iranian oil, it's unclear what impact the change would have on actual flows. China, the world's biggest importer, gets about 14% of its crude from Iran. But that figure is likely higher as some imports are masked as shipments from Malaysia, as well as the United Arab Emirates and Oman, in order to circumvent US sanctions, which Beijing doesn't recognize. Iran's oil, often purchased at a discount, is vital for China's substantial private refining sector and a crucial source of fuel for its economy, which has struggled under the weight of a slumping property sector. 'The Iranian oil sanctions have been so significant for so long, but also with relatively muted enforcement,' said Daniel Tannebaum, former Treasury official and partner at Oliver Wyman. 'It would be premature to think that this policy — which would benefit both China and Iran — would go ahead without a longer term view of ensuring stability in the region, before just literally opening up the spigots to allow legal trade of Iranian oil by China.' Trump as recently as last month insisted all purchases of Iranian oil or petrochemical products 'must stop, NOW!' and that buyers would be subject to secondary sanctions and prevented from engaging in any business with the US. That threat built on previous warnings from his administration. In February, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Washington intended to squeeze Iran's oil exports to less than 10% of current levels, as it renewed the 'maximum pressure' campaign deployed during Trump's first term. As part of that effort, the US has sanctioned hundreds of oil tankers for their role in handling Tehran's petroleum and, absent an easing in those measures, some buyers may still take a more-cautious approach. The White House has also targeted Chinese entities that bought Iranian oil, something that could make other buyers wary. Likewise, secondary sanctions on Iran's sales remain in place and its not clear where the president's remarks will leave those. The sanctions were intended to force Iran to voluntarily give up uranium enrichment so that it would never be in a position to obtain a nuclear weapon. It's still unclear if US airstrikes over the weekend seriously damaged the country's nuclear facilities, while the International Atomic Energy Agency still doesn't know what happened to Tehran's stockpile of 409 kilograms (902 pounds) of highly-enriched uranium — potentially enough for 10 nuclear warheads. --With assistance from Alaric Nightingale, Julian Lee, Jordan Fabian, Alexander Pearson and Kate Sullivan. (Updates to add comment from senior White House official from the ninth paragraph.) Luxury Counterfeiters Keep Outsmarting the Makers of $10,000 Handbags Inside Gap's Last-Ditch, Tariff-Addled Turnaround Push Ken Griffin on Trump, Harvard and Why Novice Investors Won't Beat the Pros Is Mark Cuban the Loudmouth Billionaire that Democrats Need for 2028? Can 'MAMUWT' Be to Musk What 'TACO' Is to Trump? ©2025 Bloomberg L.P. 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Fox News
27 minutes ago
- Fox News
Blinken shreds Trump's Iran strikes, though he hopes they ‘inflicted maximum damage'
Former Biden Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemned President Donald Trump's strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities on Tuesday, though he held out some hope they'd have their intended effect. "The strike on three of Iran's nuclear facilities by the United States was unwise and unnecessary. Now that it's done, I very much hope it succeeded," he wrote in a New York Times guest essay. U.S. military B-2 stealth bomber aircraft dropped 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs on three nuclear facilities on Saturday in an attack Trump called "a spectacular military success." The president announced on Truth Social on Monday that both Israel and Iran had agreed to a ceasefire following the U.S. strikes, although a frustrated Trump lashed out at both countries on Tuesday morning for continued hostilities. The administration has since pushed back against media reports that the attacks did not obliterate Iran's nuclear capabilities but instead were only a temporary setback. Blinken not only trashed Trump's strikes on Iran but criticized the president's entire strategy in dealing with the country, which started with him tearing up former President Barack Obama's Iran nuclear deal in 2018 and culminated in Saturday's strikes. "In 2018, President Trump tore up the agreement and replaced it with … nothing. In response, Iran accelerated its enrichment, quite likely reducing its breakout time to a matter of days or weeks. Mr. Trump, in essence, is now trying to put out a fire on which he poured gasoline," Blinken said. Blinken also argued Trump jumped the gun when there was still time for diplomacy with the Iranian regime. "As of now — and there are conflicting messages coming from within the Trump administration — our intelligence agencies believe Iran has not yet made a decision to weaponize. If and when it does, it would take Tehran 18 to 24 months to produce an explosive device, according to some estimates," he said. "In other words, there was still time for diplomacy to work, and the situation wasn't nearly the emergency that Mr. Trump portrayed it to be." He added, "Experts I've spoken to had real doubts about the ability of the Massive Ordnance Penetrator, or M.O.P. — the 30,000-pound bombs unique to America's arsenal that were dropped on Iran's nuclear sites — to fully incapacitate the Fordo site and other deeply buried or fortified components of Iran's nuclear program." Trump ripped media critics on Tuesday that he accused of casting doubt on the effectiveness of his strikes. Singling out CNN, he said, "But when I see CNN, all night long, they're trying to say, 'Well, maybe it wasn't really as demolished as we thought.' It was demolished. You take a look at the pinpricks, and you see that place is gone. And I will say, I think CNN ought to apologize to the pilots of the B-2s." Blinken did admit he hoped Trump's attack was successful. "I wish that he had played out the diplomatic hand we left him," Blinken wrote. "Now that the military die has been cast, I can only hope that we inflicted maximum damage — damage that gives the president the leverage he needs to finally deliver the deal he has so far failed to achieve." The White House did not immediately reply to Fox News Digital's request for comment.
