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Matt Phillips

As oil spikes, energy stocks again lead US markets

The S&P 500’s energy stocks (Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund) are some of the few bright spots in the blue-chip index Thursday, after continued US and Israeli bombing and renewed Iranian attacks on energy infrastructure throughout the Middle East diminished hopes that the Islamic Republic’s military action to disrupt the flow of oil and gas out of the Gulf would quickly peter out.

“There are no signs that either the US and Israeli attacks or the Iranian retaliatory missile and drone strikes are slowing down,” Arne Lohmann Rasmussen, chief analyst at Global Risk Management, told reporters for Platt’s Commodity News early Thursday.

US gas drillers such as APA Corporation, Devon Energy, and Coterra Energy are seeing sizable gains as QatarEnergy’s ongoing shutdown of liquefied natural gas production has sent global gas prices soaring. QatarEnergy fully shut down gas liquefaction on Wednesday. It is unclear when it will resume liquefaction, but once it does, it will take a month for Qatar’s LNG production to hit peak capacity again.

US crude oil prices are also on the rise, with NYMEX continuous futures on West Texas Intermediate — the US oil benchmark — up to over $78 shortly after 10 a.m. ET. That’s the highest since the start of the war and the highest price for US crude since early 2025.

Indeed, oil market participants are currently putting almost as big a premium for a barrel of Brent crude delivered as soon as possible relative to future delivery as they did during the energy shock that followed Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

The surge in energy prices in recent months — amid US interventions first in Venezuela and now Iran — has turned energy stocks into the biggest winner of the year among the S&P 500’s 11 so-called industry “sectors.”

The rise in crude bodes poorly for US gasoline prices, but it’s a boon to US refiners and marketers: Valero and Phillips 66 are posting solid gains on the day.

Airlines, sensitive to short-term swings in fuel prices, also fell. Budget airlines including Allegiant and Frontier were down more than 6%. Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, and American Airlines were all down more than 5%.

And since gasoline prices will mechanically work as a tax on consumption, it’s unsurprising to see that Thursday’s biggest losers early were consumer staples stocks, with that sector (Consumer Staples Select Sector SPDR Fund) down more than 2%.

Walmart and Dollar General — whose less affluent customers can be especially sensitive to higher gasoline prices — were leading the charge lower there.

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Claire Yubin Oh & David Crowther

BYND rises on elevated volumes, has now doubled in the last 10 days after product revamps

Beyond Meat soared as much as 18% in overnight trading, extending a winning streak that has seen the stock nearly double since April 10, after gaining over 41% in yesterday's session alone.

That's a significant turnaround for the meat alternative company, which just three weeks ago was tanking after issuing weak sales guidance... with the company’s management laying blame on American society for its business struggles.

Beyond repair?

BYND has had two distinct moments in the sun: one as a bonafide startup stud promising to transform the food industry forever in 2020 and 2021, and the other as a meme-stock, when the company suddenly found itself at the center of a retail trading frenzy last October after a tumultuous few years.

Sparking this latest tick higher appears to be a new product release from last Thursday, when the company revealed that Beyond Immerse, the company's first functional beverage line, had signed a distribution agreement with Big Geyser — one of the country's largest non-alcoholic distributors. That followed an update to its breakfast sausage range just three days earlier.

It's a big ask for a new sausage or protein-packed drinks with fruity flavors — both highly competitive categories — to fully save a company that’s seen sales sink, losses balloon, and its share price crater through the years. But the product news, combined with Beyond appeasing Nasdaq regulators by finally filing its delayed 2025 annual report, seems to have been enough to reinvigorate investor interest, shaking off some concerns about a delisting.

Perhaps most importantly however, is that retail traders are once again fishing in the higher-risk, higher-reward, end of the stock market pond. Risk-on assets have ripped higher in the last few weeks as geopolitical risks calmed, bringing indexes to an all-time high and seeing meme-like stocks soar on speculative excitement rather than business fundamentals. Just from last week, we’ve seen Allbirds and Myseum skyrocket on a surprise AI pivot news. Retail favorites like quantum name IonQ have also caught a bid.

But, where Beyond’s concerned, this ain't 2021 yet. And it's still nowhere near last October, either:

Per Bloomberg data, there’s still plenty of interest in betting against the company — short interest as a percent of the equity float is at 35% — but it still pales compared to the 83% level from its October high.

In simple volume terms, BYND traded only some $224 million as of yesterday — a tiny fraction of October’s busiest day, when $11 billion changed hands.

markets
J. Edward Moreno

UnitedHealth beats Q1 estimates, raises annual outlook

UnitedHealth rose in premarket trading after it reported earnings results that beat Wall Street expectations and raised its full-year guidance.

For the full year 2026, the company now expects:

  • Annual adjusted earnings per share to be at least $18.25, up from the previous floor it set at $17.75, and higher than the $17.86 analysts polled by FactSet were expecting.

For the first quarter of 2026, the company reported:

  • Adjusted earnings per share of $7.23 , higher than the $6.58 the Street was penciling in.

  • A medical cost ratio of 83.9%, lower than the 85.5% that was expected.

The company, which is the first of its peers to report earnings this quarter, was up more than 6% in early action on Tuesday. The stock is down 3.8% from the start of the year through yesterday's close.

markets
Max Knoblauch

Alaska Air expects higher fuel costs to add $600 million in expenses in Q2

Alaska Airlines on Monday kicked off a big week for airline earnings, reporting its first-quarter results after the bell. The stock ticked down after hours.

Alaska Air reported:

  • An adjusted loss of $1.68 per share, compared to Wall Street estimates of a loss of $1.65 per share.

  • $3.3 billion in revenue, compared to estimates of $3.29 billion.

  • A 17% year-over-year increase in fuel costs to $796 million.

Looking ahead, Alaska said it expects a second-quarter loss per share of $1, deeper than the Wall Street consensus (-$0.15). The company expects April fuel costs of $4.75/gallon and for fuel across the second quarter to add $600 million in expenses.

“Absent the fuel price spike, we would have guided to a solidly profitable quarter,” the airline said in its release.

Alaska Air, like the rest of the commercial airline industry, has been pummeled by fuel costs since the beginning of the war in Iran. Along with Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and JetBlue, the carrier recently hiked its bag fees to offset higher fuel costs.

Luke Kawa
14h
Amazon to invest up to $25 billion more in Anthropic; Claude developer to spend more than $100 billion on AWS AI technology

This is the latest edition of a frenetic dash for AI compute to power Claude, which is undergoing some problems of success.

Trainum - Amazon AWS
Tasha Matsumoto
15h
Stocks close lower as Trump says Strait of Hormuz will remain closed until deal is signed

Oil raillied and stocks closed lower, paring steeper losses.

Bears fighting

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