Bonds React to Trump

Trump’s Iran threats pushed Treasury yields higher on fresh inflation fears.

Author

Ankit Sinha
April 02, 2026

Your Daily Dose of Market & Career Clarity

📬 Delivered to 150,000+ ambitious readers

Silver banana goes to…

Get a Top Job Offer, Guaranteed (or tuition is free) | Apply Here


Market Snapshot

📉 Banana Bits

Market News

Optimism… With an Asterisk

U.S. stocks rallied sharply for two consecutive days (Tuesday and Wednesday, March 31–April 1) as investors grew more optimistic that the Middle East conflict could be nearing a resolution.

The S&P 500 rose 0.7%, while the Nasdaq-100 climbed 1.2%, extending gains from the previous session after comments from Donald Trump suggested the U.S. could end its military campaign against Iran within two to three weeks.

Trump also said Iran had requested a ceasefire, though Iran’s foreign ministry denied the claim. Optimism around a potential de-escalation weighed on oil prices, with Brent Crude briefly slipping below $100 a barrel as traders reassessed the risk of supply disruptions.

The shift in sentiment rippled across global markets. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.5%, while the MSCI World Index gained 1.4% as equities broadly followed the U.S. rally.

Meanwhile, the Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index fell for a second day, signaling reduced demand for safe-haven assets. Treasury markets were more mixed, with the U.S. 10-Year Treasury Yield edging up to 4.33% and the U.S. 2-Year Treasury Yield rising to 3.81% following strong U.S. labor market and retail sales data, which reinforced expectations that the economy remains resilient despite geopolitical uncertainty.

Investors, however, remain cautious about declaring a sustained rebound. Some strategists noted that the sharp rally may partly reflect short covering after heavy bearish positioning rather than a lasting improvement in fundamentals.

Meanwhile, damage to energy facilities and uncertainty over shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, which carries roughly 20% of global crude flows, continue to pose risks to energy markets and global growth if tensions persist.

Peel Take: Markets are trading on hope rather than certainty. The recent rally suggests investors are quickly pricing in a potential end to the conflict, but the real barometer will be oil prices and energy flows. If crude stabilizes below $100 and shipping through the Strait of Hormuz remains uninterrupted, risk assets could extend gains. But any escalation or prolonged disruption could quickly revive inflation fears and send volatility back into global markets.

What's Ripe

Intel Corp. (INTC) 8.8%

  • INTC gained 8.8% after the chipmaker agreed to buy back Apollo Global Management’s stake in a joint venture tied to its Ireland semiconductor factory.

  • The deal values the transaction at about $14.2 billion, with Intel planning to finance the buyback using cash on hand alongside roughly $6.5 billion in newly issued debt.

  • Peel Take: Intel’s move signals a push to regain fuller control over its manufacturing assets as it doubles down on its long-term semiconductor strategy. While the deal adds leverage through new debt, investors appear to view the buyback as a step toward strengthening Intel’s position in the global chip race.

Marvell Technology Inc. (MRVL) 7.7%

  • MRVL added 7.7%, extending momentum from the previous session when the stock surged nearly 13%.

  • Shares rallied after Nvidia pledged to invest $2 billion in the semiconductor company as part of a new strategic partnership aimed at strengthening capabilities in advanced AI and data-center infrastructure.

  • Peel Take: The investment underscores Nvidia’s push to deepen its ecosystem around AI hardware and networking chips. For Marvell, the partnership signals stronger positioning in the rapidly expanding AI data-center market, helping fuel investor optimism about long-term growth tied to the AI boom.

What's Rotten

Nike Inc. (NKE) 15.5%

  • NKE slumped 15% after the sportswear giant issued a cautious outlook despite beating earnings and revenue expectations in its fiscal third quarter.

  • The company warned that sales are likely to decline through the remainder of the year, overshadowing the stronger-than-expected quarterly results and triggering a sharp selloff in the stock.

  • Peel Take: Nike’s results highlight a growing divide between strong current performance and weakening forward demand. Investors appear more focused on the company’s outlook than on its recent earnings beat, signaling concerns that softer consumer spending and inventory adjustments could weigh on near-term growth.

Chevron Corp. (CVX) 4.6%

  • CVX declined by more than 4.5% as investors anticipated an end to the Iran conflict, which triggered a sharp drop in oil prices and weighed on energy stocks.

  • Lower crude prices tend to pressure oil producers’ revenue outlook, prompting investors to rotate out of the sector as geopolitical risk premiums fade.

  • Peel Take: Energy stocks surged during the conflict as supply fears pushed oil above $100. Now the trade is reversing; if the war premium in oil disappears, so do the windfall expectations for oil majors. The move highlights how tightly energy equities remain tied to geopolitical risk and short-term swings in crude prices.

🧠 Technical Trip

Interview Q&A from Susquehanna International

👉 Want 1-on-1 recruiting help from Susquehanna International bankers & 2,000+ top mentors? Apply to WSO Academy

📚 Lesson from the Library

🎥 Renewable Energy Project Finance: Funding the Future of Energy

Model cash flows, structure deals, and finance large-scale energy projects.

🌟 WSO Academy Q4 Update

🎥 Sessions Now Automatically Recorded & Uploaded

One of the biggest improvements this quarter is that all mentoring sessions are now automatically recorded and uploaded directly to the student’s dashboard with summaries/notes rather than mentors having to remember to do this manually.

✅ 100% compliance rate. Mentors no longer need to remember to start or upload recordings, which means that all of your videos are accessible immediately

✅ Recordings and session notes/takeaways are automatically saved to the student’s dashboard after the session

✅ You can re-watch past sessions anytime to review technical explanations or important advice

🦈 Deal Dispatch

M&A, IPOs, And Other Notable Transactions

📊The Daily Poll

Who bears the biggest cost if pharma tariffs rise?

Login or Subscribe to participate in polls.

Previous Poll:

Who takes the biggest hit from Australia’s surcharge crackdown?

Banks: 38.7% // Merchants: 12.9% // Consumers: 32.2% // Payment networks: 16.2%

Student Success Corner

👉 Are you next? Find out with WSO Academy

Banana Brain Teaser

Previous

Jackie has two solutions that are 2% sulfuric acid and 12% sulfuric acid by volume, respectively. If these solutions are mixed in appropriate quantities to produce 60 liters of a solution that is 5% sulfuric acid, approximately how many liters of the 2% solution will be required?

Answer: 42

Today

A three-digit code for certain locks uses the digits 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 according to the following constraints. The first digit cannot be 0 or 1, the second digit must be 0 or 1, and the second and third digits cannot both be 0 in the same code. How many different codes are possible?

❝

The two greatest enemies of the equity-fund investor are expenses and emotions.

John Bogle

How Would You Rate Today's Peel?


Happy Investing,
Chris, Vyom, Ankit, Mitchell, Fernanda, & Patrick