The S&P 500 declined for the 2nd straight week. Weekly market recap, trading week 25/2025

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In this series, you can find financial markets posts with the highest number of interactions from my X platform feed over the most recent week. I am aware that not everybody uses X regularly, so I thought it could provide some value to your analysis, and investment process. These posts are surrounded by extra charts, commentary and explanations of complicated topics.

The S&P 500 declined for the 2nd consecutive week as geopolitical tensions remain elevated while US economic data and the Fed somewhat disappointed markets (more on the Fed early next week). Gold and silver retreated as well.

Additionally, Japan cancelled a top-level meeting with the US after the Trump administration told Japan to spend more on defense, according to Financial Times. In other words, still no Japan-US trade deal in sight.

Meanwhile, the US has completed three attacks on nuclear sites in Iran on Saturday night. Iran already vowed to retaliate.

Following strikes on Iran’s nuclear sites in Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan, Iranian officials reported no signs of radioactive leakage or threat to nearby populations.

Subsequently, Iran parliament approved closure of Strait of Hormuz.

The Strait of Hormuz channels roughly 20–21 million barrels per day of crude oil and oil products. This accounts for about 20% of global oil consumption.

Importantly, the alternative route is way longer and much more costly.

However, two important points.

1.While Iran's parliament voted to close the Strait of Hormuz, only the Supreme National Security Council has the authority to approve this action.

2.The vote is mainly symbolic but politically important—it shows rising domestic pressure on Iranian leaders to retaliate.

If they really move on Hormuz, however, the market will likely collapse. As of now, there have been no disruptions.

Nevertheless, we should expect oil and gold prices to spike while stocks decline when the market opens. Bitcoin prices are already showing a significant weakness, as well as Weekend Wall Street prices, implying at least a 1% drop in US stock futures.

In case you missed it, this week’s posts are listed below.

1) Weekly performance. In the first post attached, you can see last week’s performance of the major US indexes, the VIX volatility index, 10-year Treasury yield, the US Dollar, gold, silver, WTI Crude oil and Bitcoin.

- S&P 500 fell 0.1%
- Nasdaq index rose 0.2%
- Dow Jones increased 0.1%
- Russell 2000 (small caps) jumped 0.5%
- US 10-year Treasury yield declined 2 bps
- VIX fell 1%
- US Dollar index rose 0.6%
- WTI Crude Oil jumped 4%
- Silver fell 0.9%
- Gold dropped 2.0%

- Bitcoin fell 2.1%

For the trading week ending June 27, key events are:

- US Existing Home Sales for May on Tuesday

- US CB Consumer Confidence for June on Tuesday

- Fed Chair Powell Speeches on Tuesday and Wednesday

- US Q1 2025 GDP Data (3rd reading) on Thursday

- US Inflation PCE data for May on Friday

- At least 15 Fed Speeches

Investors will be the most focused on the Middle East developments as well as the US inflation data.

2) How are fund managers and other institutional investors positioned in this market? What do they think about the global economy? Bank of America survey and Goldman Sachs data.

World stocks ‘sell signal’ has been almost triggered:

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