US stocks posted the best week in months. Weekly market recap, trading week 15/2026

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GLOBAL MARKETS INVESTOR’S PORTFOLIO IS 🔥UP +93%🔥 SINCE JANUARY 2024

DURING THE MARCH-APRIL 2025 MARKET TURMOIL, MAJOR US INDEXES FELL NEARLY 20%, WHILE THE GMI PORTFOLIO GAINED OVER 5%, FIND OUT HOW BELOW:

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 posted its best week since November, while the Nasdaq rose for 8 consecutive days, the longest streak since 2023.

Small caps and the Nasdaq nearly recovered all of their war losses this week, while the Dow remains the laggard.

Under the surface, semiconductors outperformed software every single day this week, the worst relative software performance week on record.

WTI crude posted its biggest weekly decline since 2020, settling near ~$95, but remains significantly above pre-war levels.

The US Dollar fell every day this week, its biggest weekly decline since April 2025 Liberation Day, while gold rallied for a 3rd straight week, up over +18% from the March 23 lows.

Bitcoin rose +9%, posting its best week since early October 2025.

Meanwhile, the US and Iran failed to reach a peace agreement after 21 hours of marathon talks in Islamabad.

Three key sticking points remained unresolved: 1) the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, 2) the fate of nearly 900 pounds of highly enriched uranium, and 3) Iran's demand for ~$27 billion in frozen revenues held abroad.

Iran refused to reopen the Strait until a final peace deal is reached, while the US demanded immediate and unconditional reopening.

VP Vance said Iran failed to commit to not seeking a nuclear weapon, while Iranian media said the US made "excessive" demands.

However, both sides left the door open for further talks, with Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesman saying on state television that "diplomacy never ends."

Meanwhile, Trump shared an article about imposing a naval blockade on Iran, signaling a potential escalation if Tehran refuses to reopen the Strait.

On the positive side, Saudi Arabia restored full pumping capacity at its East-West pipeline to 7 million barrels per day, and has recovered 300,000 barrels per day of production at Manifa, though 300,000 remain offline at Khurais.

Expect oil to open higher and stocks to open lower on Monday.

In case you missed it, other posts from this week 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 +3.6%
- Nasdaq +4.7%
- Russell 2000 (small caps) +4.0%
- Dow Jones +3.0%
- US 10-year Treasury yield -3 basis points
- Bank Index +5.6%
- VIX -19%, front-month contract VIX futures -17%
- US Dollar index -1.4%
- Gold +1.9%
- Silver +4.6%
- WTI Crude Oil +15%

- Bitcoin +8.8%

For the trading week ending April 17, key events are:

- US Existing Home Sales for March on Monday

- US PPI Inflation for March on Tuesday

- US Small Business Sentiment data on Tuesday

- US Industrial Production for March on Thursday

- At least 7 Fed speakers

Pretty muted week ahead in terms of economic data.

2) Retail investors have turned extremely bearish. Hedge funds have unwound some shorts but remain significantly bearish overall as well.

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