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Fireworks explode (Li Ying/Getty Images)

Everything has a reason to go up now that oil’s down*

*Exceptions include energy and chemicals stocks.

All’s well because oil fell.

US stocks are off to the races on Wednesday morning after the US and Iran agreed to a two-week ceasefire, during which time oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz are expected to pick up as the two sides look to negotiate a more enduring peace.

The winners in premarket trading include:

Stocks where oil is a high input cost, like cruises and airlines: American Airlines, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines, Carnival, and Norwegian Cruise Line.
- Delta’s better-than-expected Q1 results are also helping that stock.
The megacaps: all of the Magnificent 7 are up at least 2% in premarket trading as of 9:05 a.m. ET, with Meta and Tesla leading the way higher.
The fringes of the AI compute and power trade: names like Applied Digital (which reports earnings today), other data center stocks like Cipher Digital, IREN, CoreWeave, and Nebius, zero-revenues nuclear company Oklo, and Bloom Energy.
The enduring sources of AI momentum: memory and optics, like Micron, Coherent, Seagate Technology Holdings, Western Digital, Corning, Lumentum, Ciena Corp., Sandisk, and Applied Optoelectronics.
Speculative stocks like the quantum computing companies (D-Wave Quantum, Rigetti Computing, Infleqtion, and IonQ) and others like Plug Power, Rocket Lab, and SoundHound AI.
And Robinhood Markets, which benefits from higher trading activity and rising markets, is also up massively.

(Robinhood Markets Inc. is the parent company of Sherwood Media, an independently operated media company subject to certain legal and regulatory restrictions.)

In short, everything is up except oil and chemicals stocks, and if West Texas Intermediate front-month crude futures closed here, it would be their biggest one-day drop since April 2020 (as of 8:42 a.m.).

Our losers are thus the likes of Exxon, Dow, Inc., CF Industries, and APA Corporation, which had been benefiting from the rise in energy prices.

Even with a fragile ceasefire in place, the energy crisis is far from over. Here’s what to watch for.

In a Q&A with Sherwood, commodities analyst Rory Johnston lays out how to better understand the oil market’s situation.

Matt Phillips17m

Matt Phillips2h

Data center trade revived on Iran war ceasefire

Data center stocks leapt early Wednesday, as the Iran war ceasefire reinvigorated risk-taking aimed at the booming AI build-out.

A wide range of stocks related to building and powering data center shells, filling them with chips, servers, racks, and memory, and then connecting those racks to one another and users around the world bounced hard in early trading.

Memory stocks like Micron, Western Digital, Seagate Technology Holdings, and Sandisk — favorites of retail traders given their massive performance in recent years — climbed.

Traders seemed to price in durable demand for memory and other chips, with the companies that make the machines that actually make semiconductors rising sharply as well. Dutch semiconductor machinery giant ASML rose, as did Applied Materials, Lam Research, and KLA Corp.

Fiber-optic cable and connecting companies like Lumentum, Coherent, Corning, and Applied Optoelectronics — which had been on a run before the outbreak of Mideast hostilities — regained momentum.

And the construction and engineering companies — MasTec, Vertiv Holdings, Quanta Services, and Comfort Systems USA — that have been feasting on the cash pouring into data center building and engineering also jumped.

Max Knoblauch3h

Airlines and cruise stocks spike after oil plunges on 2-week ceasefire with Iran

Travel stocks are surging Wednesday following President Trump’s announcement on Tuesday evening of a two-week ceasefire with Iran.

West Texas Intermediate crude futures were down about 16% as of 7 a.m. ET. Airlines, which have been pounded by higher jet fuel costs for more than a month now, moved in the opposite direction. Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, and American Airlines were up more than 10% in premarket trading. Southwest Airlines and JetBlue also rose by high single digits. Three major US airlines (JetBlue, United, and Delta) raised baggage fees in recent days as fuel costs climbed.

Cruise stocks also rallied, with Carnival, Norwegian Cruise Line, and Royal Caribbean all up more than 7%.

Max Knoblauch3h

Delta reports better-than-expected Q1 earnings, surges as oil plummets

Delta Air Lines reported its first-quarter results before markets opened on Wednesday. The carrier’s shares surged 12% in premarket trading.

Delta, which as of today will charge passengers $10 more per checked bag, reported:

Adjusted earnings of $0.64 per share, compared to the $0.58 per share expected by analysts polled by FactSet.
Adjusted operating revenue of $14.2 billion, compared to estimates of $14 billion.

Looking ahead, Delta said it expects Q2 earnings per share of between $1 and $1.50, below Wall Street estimates of $1.56 per share — which might be enough to disappoint investors if oil, one of the largest inputs for an airline’s fuel cost base, wasn’t tanking. Indeed, West Texas Intermediate crude futures are down more than 16% on Wednesday morning, following President Trump’s comments that he agreed to a two-week ceasefire with Iran on Tuesday evening. Delta did not give any full-year earnings guidance in its press release.

Like other carriers, Delta has taken a hit in recent weeks as oil — and jet fuel — prices spike amid the war in Iran. Significant delays, cancellations, and rebookings have also battered US airlines.

Delta, which is becoming an increasingly K-shaped airline, saw premium tickets grow 14% year over year in the first quarter, compared to 1% growth in main cabin tickets.

J. Edward Moreno4h

Levi Strauss jumps after raising full-year guidance, reporting earnings beat

Levi Strauss rose more than 11% in premarket trading Wednesday after it beat earnings expectations and raised its full-year guidance.

For its fiscal year 2026, which ends December 1, the apparel giant now expects to report:

Revenue growth between 5.5% and 6.5%, up from 5% to 6%. Analysts polled by FactSet are penciling in about 6.21% sales growth.
Adjusted earnings per share between $1.42 and $1.48, up from $1.40 to $1.46 but still a hair below the $1.49 Wall Street is expecting.

The company also beat expectations for its first quarter, which ended March 1. It reported:

Quarterly adjusted earnings per share of $0.42, versus the $0.37 expected.
Revenue of $1.74 billion, more than 5% ahead of the $1.65 billion that was expected, with direct-to-consumer sales making up the majority of its revenue stream for the quarter.

The stock is up nearly 11% as of 6:35 a.m. ET, having shed roughly ~5% from the start of the year to yesterday’s close.