Power Lunch - Market Reacts to Iran War 3/2/26

Episode Date: March 2, 2026

Stocks turn positive after opening down. Crude oil, natural gas prices pop. And RBC Capital Markets' Helima Croft and TWG Global Managing Partner Amos Hochstein join the show to discuss the possible effects of the Iran War. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Markets were turning around, at least earlier, as the historic developments in Iran unfold, but there is a long way to go, and the risk remains high. With Kelly and Brian, thanks for watching, Power Lunch, everybody. We've got everything you need to know about what is going on, including two big voices you have to hear. Halima Kroft is here, along with seasoned diplomat and energy expert, Amos Haxton. They're going to lay out what really matters right now. Plus, to make sense of the market reaction and what all of this could mean for your investments, we're joined by Jan Vanek.

the CEO of Vanek, global investment firm with nearly $200 billion under management. It's going to break down where the smart money is moving, where risk is rising, what you need to know before your next trade. And yes, we'll talk some Bitcoin too. I noticed that it was up about 5% a little while ago. Yeah, I love Jan because he can talk about everything. But let's start with the incredible news around Iran and the Middle East because things are still developing hour by hour. Oil and natural gas prices, both higher, though well off through initial highs from last night. But that bid is bringing buyers in many of the stocks as well. Exxon, Chevron, Occidental, Conical Phillips, they're all higher. Natural gas and LNG companies also popping as Iran knocks

Qatar's entire LNG production offline. Qatar, the largest LNG producing country in the world. Sheneer, Venture Global stocks, both moving higher venture global up 14%. It also posted results this morning. And as the attacks continue, the focus is on building out the American defense industry with Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics, all those stocks also being bought right now. And while the strike on Iran is considered a success by the White House, the risk far from over, as ships still remain stuck at the Strait of Hormuz, waiting for some form of all clear, waiting for safety, waiting for whatever. That's a live map.

The red dots all reflect the ship. And you could see in the straight-of-four moves? Stand still. Stand-still. Literally at anchor, nobody is going through in either direction. And maybe also waiting for insurance to help with that and get through the 20-mile-wide passage, maybe the most dangerous waterway in the world right now. Here with us, RBC Capital Markets, Global Head of Commodity Strategy, Halima Croft.

I feel like that map. That Strait of Hormuz live map from marine traffic is kind of the one thing we should all be watching. I mean, the Strait of Hormuz is essentially a parking lot. And prior to the events over the weekend, all the scenarios were could Iran close the Straits of Hormuz? Could they use their ships from Bonder Abbas to target tankers? They didn't really have to do that. Essentially, insurance companies decided to close the Straits of Hormuz. And so the question is, what is going to give these countries?

company's comfort, that that is a safe waterway to navigate. And we have seen tax on tankers. We have seen the Iranians, you know, outside the S-curve, do a number of strikes on key Gulf energy producers. You mentioned Rass Lafon. Like, that is a major facility. Like, if you had said that the Qataris, who were essentially the Switzerland of the Middle East in terms of everybody goes there to negotiate, the fact that that major facility, the largest LNG, facility in the world would be taken offline, I think that shows you that the risk profile of this conflict extending is very high. What other, is this the primary way that you think Iran can now respond to the attacks?

So we've seen them obviously launch a number of attacks against other countries in the region, which is now enraging them. But what other major options does it have, or is this probably the main avenue they can respond with? Well, I think what's important is there reports out now that the UAE may potentially only have seven days of interceptors left. Qatar, maybe four, and reports that both these two key allies of the United States are potentially looking for us to strike a deal. If you target these countries, if you target their energy assets,

you essentially internationalize the cost of the conflict and you raise the price. So I think that is a calculation for Iran. They're willing to have bad relations, but they're in survival mode as well. The Supreme Leader is gone. Many of his top lieutenants are gone. If the regime believes that this the path to survival, I think they're willing to incur poor relations with the neighbors. Are you surprised oil and gas are only up 6%? I think a lot of people in this market still believe it's a short conflict. The White House, I think, has been messaging that this will be short, that they will have this under control soon. And so the question is, are we multi-day or multi-week? That cannot remain a parking lot

in the Strait of Hormuz for a multi-week period and have Brent prices sitting at $78. Well, the oil, so let's hone into that a little bit. And I spent the weekend, as we all did working and talking to, I talked to insurance executives as well. And there is some talk that the oil has to flow. The oil has to go somewhere. It's coming out of the ground. You're not going to turn that off. So the oil is going to go into floating storage first, but then ultimately run out of ships. It has to move. There is some talk, and I'll report it right now, that maybe there's some kind of a Ukraine, Russia-like three-day ceasefire of sorts where oil can flow both ways. Is it fair to say, Halima, that Iran wants to cause damage, but also Iran needs the money, don't they? Well, let's say if you're playing for time, if Iran believes that they can use their drones and their missiles to inflict enough pain, like shock and awe on the neighboring states, that they make us stand down, I think they're willing to have a suspension of energy revenue for a period to try to change our calculations. The other thing I would say is that you say oil has to go somewhere. there are not great viable exit routes for the straight of hormones. Yes, there is an east-west pipeline that Saudi could use to move five million barrels,

but that was struck in the summer of 2019. And where is the exit for that pipeline? That basically lands you Red Sea. Who's in range? Hootie missiles for that. So again, if you ask the question of exit routes, you have to ask then, are those exit routes particularly secure? I'm glad you brought that up.

So it also sort of trying to get the visual straight. If we're hoping to starve Iran of money, for lack of a better word, that would starve those proxies like the Houthis, is that how it's going to work or no? It's not a multi-day campaign then. And that is the question for the administration is, how long are you prepared to endure attacks on neighboring states that are our allies? And how long are you willing to endure potentially higher prices? There are real limits to what you can accomplish when it comes to regime change by air power alone. You can do decapitation, but the question is, what are our goals? And a great question for Amos Hexene is, do they align with Israel's goals as well?

Do they have more expansive goals when it comes to Iran's missile capabilities, drone capabilities, and who's in charge than we do? What's left of their capability? So especially when you bring up the issue of saying, okay, Dubai or UAE may only have seven days left of being able to defend itself. Well, how much more is in the stock? Again, I think the important question is, do we differentiate between what's in your missile stocks? And some people will say experts will say they maybe can do it with missiles for another month or beyond that. Their drone capabilities are substantial. Even if we just decapitated them or no?

I mean, that is, I mean, Kelly, like look what they're using. They're using a lot of drones. Most of the attacks that we're talking about, you know, Ross Lafon, those are drones. But meaning did we, did we, I shouldn't have used that word, but did we, others have suggested we've taken out that drone? We have to see because there's supply chain. That is, I mean, right now, no indications. I've heard anyone say that they have been seriously disabled. And the Iranians are so good at producing low-cost drones, they provide them to the Russians.

That's what Dan Clifton. I'm going to ask Amos is probably this exact same question. So almost if you're watching. Just to bring him out. Here comes probably a question coming for you soon, which is we don't know. Nobody knows what's next. So what they do in Iran, they convene a group they call literally they're called the Assembly of Experts. They get together, and they kind of...

In 40 days. Correct. They pick a new leader. The Ayatollah Khamini was, by all accounts, 86 years old. He may have been older. In other words... Cancer, yes. There was a life's...

A natural exit plan for him outside of this. So who's next? There were reports that he was also prepared to be martyred. He did not want to be put in an orange jumpsuit and march through lower Manhattan courthouses. So, I mean, this was something that was... Al-a-Niclos-Moduro Venezuela. Our Venezuelan leader, who's now awaiting trial.

The question is, where are the redundancies in Iran? I've heard there are significant redundancies. And to the IRGC... What does that mean redundancies? Basically, who do you go to next? So essentially, they have a battle plan, at least for the IRGC, where you take out top ranks, you have people ready to step up. Question for the Supreme Leader is, does the IRGC even really want a Supreme Leader? Are we looking at an IRGC-led government going forward?

Do we even have... A full hunter? Like a full military? IRGC controlled government that might be even more hard line. Do we have a sort of maybe a chaotic situation, contest for power? I think all of those things we have to like take into account. And then, of course, where is the Iranian opposition? I mean, President Trump has said, like, we're waiting for you.

Now's your moment. Is there any signs that somebody is going to be able to step forward? This National Council of Resistance, Mariam Rajavi is, you know, they've been putting out some ads and so forth. Like, again, there's not a great institutional history to draw upon to try to make this kind of change. So the odds would be against them, I would tell you. I mean, the concerning reports that we hear from experts is that, you know, the scenarios that people are thinking about is, like, trying to find a Delci Rodriguez in the Revolutionary Guard. Like, that may be how President Trump basically declares victory. Somebody who doesn't like us but would work with us.

Delsi Rodriguez, Darcy Rodriguez, this probably does not like us, but she'll work with us. And she'll take a check. And you'll take that's that's I wouldn't you're the most direct person I know and I wouldn't have it any other way. Let me throw this at you because I would brand this as an RBI, but it's too serious. But this is insane. I don't know if you guys realize this. With this oil move, it's not even a top 25% oil move ever. Now, we just killed the leader of Iran and some of his top lieutenants.

And we don't get a top 25 oil move percentage. I thought that would happen, because there's a lot of oil right now. But are you surprised by this? I think what is interesting is that if this had been pre-shale revolution, we'd be in such a higher price point. So I think some of it is the abundance supply in the United States has given us comfort that we are well supplied. I don't think we have a lot of OPEC shock absorbers, though, if we get a physical market disruption. The real question, though, is did market participants basically over the weekend, say this is going to be a short war. It's shock and awe, but this will be over in a week.

If you think it's going to be over in a week, this move makes sense. If you think that this is multi-week, multi-month, and cascading outages, you have to be thinking about a higher price environment. So duration will absolutely be key. And just quickly, when we say over, the real thing that I think the oil markets care about, but I'm not sure, is whether they can get through the Strait of Hormuz. Is that if, would should we equate those two? Straight of Hormuz, obviously, because, you know, that is 20% of, you know, oil going through their LNG going through there. But also they will be watching, is there another abcake attack looming? That was the attack in 2019, which is, by the way, the single biggest day move in the price of oil in the last 30 years, oil's up 15% that day.

And the Saudis were very good at honoring customer commitments. They basically ensured that there was no disruption, but they had available sea lanes. So if, in other words, it's one thing for the president to get there and say it's over. but really the way the market perceives that it's over is free flowing through the street. Free flowing oil and essentially statements that, very slim and almost Venezuela, like we're ready to work with the United States.

If you basically have some type of resolution at the end where someone comes forward in the IRGC or whoever is in charge and says, we're done, like in June. Remember in June essentially? We had the wind down and everyone's like, we're going back to our corners. Yeah. Yeah.

And we had Brent at 78. We're not even at 78 right now. We're below that point. And yet we took out. The last thing I would say, do we have recency bias? Because of the way June occurred and there was no disruption. Are we thinking, are we using the June playbook? Kalima, always great to get your insight. As usual, important times. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. We're just getting started here. Don't go anywhere. Stocks are off session lows. Nasdaq is positive. A lot of questions still to be answered, though. As you just heard, energy defense, crypto. That's where you're seeing most of the green today. We'll talk the mid-east impact. on the markets. More broadly with Jan Vanek right after this. I want to take a look at the markets, which have been fluctuating.

But the biggest story is that we went from declines last night and this morning to what we're seeing now, which is almost universally green on your screen there. Dow's down 25 points right now. The NASDAX's up half a percent. The S&P is positive by 11 points, all rebounding from initially trading lower as the U.S.-Iran conflict enters a third day. Here for more on how investors should position and think about these escalating geopolitical political risks, is Jan Vanek. He is the CEO of Vanek funds. It's great to see you. Helima just was talking there about China and the kind of knock on effect this could have.

And whether they've been, as Doug Bergam said, stockpiling to maybe be ready for a scenario like this. And what would you be kind of following there? Yeah. I mean, there's one concept or one dimension of this that no one seemingly has mentioned, which is Karg Island. What's Karg Island, right? It's where 90% of Iran's oil gets exported out of. That is a choke point. And if you think of Trump just follows the same playbook that he did in Venezuela, what did he do? He cut off their oil exports, their hard currency. And I think he's going to want that leverage point going forward because we were talking about succession.

What happens in Iran, no one knows. But boy, if you control their oil exports and then the second point, China, bring that in, where did 80 to 90 percent of Venezuelan oil exports go? China. Yeah. Where does 80 to 90% of Iranian oil exports go? China. So it's really amazing they're not more involved, I guess. I think they're thinking a lot about what's going on. But the consequences, I think if we get control over the finances and the oil exports, that would be a major military objective that we're not talking about. Control of Iran's oil. I mean, that's... How would they do that? It's all, it all goes through Carg Island. So it's 90% of their exports. The floating island, loading terminal. off the coast inside the Persian Gulf. They got a little thing on the other side in the Gulf of Oman.

But how would we take that over? I'm not a military planner. All I'm saying is that I think if you're thinking about this being a permanent demilitarization of Iran, you want to control the money flow, and that's the money flow. And so for China, which has about 17 percent of its oil supplies come from Venezuela and Iran, we're told. So it's not existential, but it's problematic. And we have this big meeting coming up between China's leader and Trump in a couple of weeks.

And could that be a moment that the U.S. has built up enough leverage that they kind of walk away from this in a mutually agreeable position instead of the position where China's talking to the U.S. about its plans with Taiwan or something like that. It gives Trump a lot more negotiating power. And I don't think he wants, has to use it, right? He said that in Venezuela. We'll sell oil to whomever. But we want to make sure it's going to peaceful people in Iran. I would think that that's an objective. It's speculation.

No, but first off, we're all speculating. As an industry executive I spoke with this weekend said to me, if you tell me who's running Iran, I'll tell you where things go, because nobody actually knows. It could be somebody who's more antagonistic to the U.S. of the West, okay? Or it could be somebody who's a little more friendly to the U.S. of the West. Maybe maybe wants to make a deal in the nuclear program. Suddenly Iran's exporting three million barrels a day, not one and a half,

and the price of oil actually goes down. how much of all of what we're doing right now is trying to figure out what they're going to do in Tehran. Because if you know, tell me. I'm not sure it matters, right? If they are demilitarized, if they have no functioning Navy, Army, missiles, drone manufacturing, whatever, then kind of who cares, right?

So anyway, listen, I think as far as the markets are concerned, you know, oil and gold, if I can turn to that, maybe, I think oil was oversupplied coming into this year. We're looking in the second half. We were bullish because basically the shale production can't be increasing the way it has, keeping up with global growth. That's why OIH is up 37% this year. So I think energy is the best performing sector in the market.

I think so that's all kind of priced in. It explains why Haleimo is talking about China building inventories in this more fully supplied market, because if we're right that it's going to be tighter at the end of the year, that's just prudent. Yeah, maybe a little less shale on the margin, and so you get a little bit higher oil price once we even move past this conflict. And then what about gold? Yeah, gold. I think for me, I've been very bullish gold for multiple years because I say it's becoming the world's next kind of international currency. People want to control it.

And so I don't think a geopolitical event like this is what drives gold, nor does U.S.-centric things like inflation. that's missing the narrative. The narrative is people want control over their own money. This is a reminder, yes, but it's not geopolitical risk. You referenced the OIH, which happens to be known as the Vanek Oil Services ETIA. I don't know if you know this Vanek guy, but he's something. So that indexed down a little bit today, but who cares up 38% this year, even with $66 oil. Exxon Mobil soaring, Chevron soaring, ConocoPhillips soaring. Are you surprised? that those stocks have been so strong given, we don't have $95 oil. We have $65 oil.

No, but markets predict these tighter markets in the second half of the year for oil. So no, am I surprised? No, not at all. You know, now they're kind of rich now. So I'm not saying like pile in because we're inning one of this trend. I think we're further into it than that. I just want to mention if you're right, there is going to be a problem for the U.S. economy. at some, again, maybe we're helped by the production of it.

But if we are living through something like we were in the early 2000s, when the oil price went to 140 and the price of nat gas, but went everything because we were in a cap-back cycle, molecules were in short supply and everybody wanted them, you know, that's not a great scenario. Yeah, I mean, listen, everything to me is the AI trade, and we call it AI2.0 trade. We need more electricity in the United States, but that's more a gnat gas story than it is an oil story, not saying that that's the only part of the economy that matters. But that gas is basically free in the United States. It is. It is. I know we have to go.

But Kelly made it a very, very important point with Halima. And we're talking about these knock-on effects of commodity prices. Let me just frame something very quickly with you. If everything's about the AI trade, and I don't disagree with you, okay? And AI is largely powered by natural gas. What if natural gas goes to 10 or 15 bucks because Iran keeps bombing Qatar and knocking... Or the shit can't get out. Or the LNG can't get out.

We don't need Mid-East. Can the AI trade still do well if natural gas prices stay high for long? Yes. We have so much gas in the United States. We're exporting it. I mean, maybe we export less, but I can't believe that those prices for a long period of time in the U.S. That would be the biggest difference.

If our supply means that we don't experience the bad part of that 2000s run up, but that investors can get all the good part. We're in the sweet spot right now, you know, where they enjoy the gates without too much knockout effect. So, yeah, don't go too far. We're going to bring you back, okay? Jan Veneck. We'll see you later this hour. We have a news alert from the White House. Amid Jevers. What's happening? Kelly, this is a story broken by the Wall Street Journal just in the past couple of moments.

The journal reporting that the Trump administration, Department of Justice, is now prepared to drop its defense of the president's executive orders against a number of prominent law firms. You remember those executive orders last year, really roiling the legal landscape as the president sought to remove security clearances. and government contracts from firms that he perceived to be either on the other side of the aisle or operating against his administration. Now, some of the firms affected here, according to the Wall Street Journal, would be Jenner & Block, Wilmer Hale, Perkins Cooey, and Sussman Godfrey, according to the Wall Street Journal, that is. We don't have official confirmation of that today from the Department of Justice or from the White House, but it would seem, Kelly, that If there are going to be filings from the Department of Justice dropping those defenses, we could see those as early as this afternoon in court records.

So we'll keep an eye out for that and for some legal reasoning from the Department of Justice as to why they're dropping the president's cases there. Back over to you. All right, Amin, thank you very much. And we should mention the Dow has now joined the S&P and the NASDAQ in positive territory this afternoon. Dow is now up about six points. I want to talk about last night, last night when we had. had trades go live at 6 p.m. Eastern time. We were on live, CNBC, Asia, all our colleagues over there. The Dow was down a couple hundred points. Nasdaq was down one and a half percent. Oil prices

up 13 percent. Here we are. Oil is barely higher. Not even 24 hours later. And the markets are up. Yeah. Well, because that early reaction told you, usually the first reaction is the worst reaction. And if the worst that it was was, you know, a couple hundred points down on the Dow, it didn't take much for markets come back. Keep an eye, though, on the opposite side of this. Ten year going back above four percent. price is paid in the ISM report this morning. So it's like we're in the sweet spot right now or before we might turn our attention to more of the inflation story. So could we do what Jan was saying?

Could we do something with Iran's exports in a good or bad way? We don't know. But coming up, somebody who probably does, he's an insider who predicted these attacks in Iran back in January. His thoughts on the likely next steps now. What happens? Next, it is Amos Hochstein. He knows a lot.

You're going to want to hear what he has to say. That's next. All right. Welcome back. And as we said, the markets, all three major indexes are now higher. Crypto is higher. Oil and gas. Also, higher, that is not a surprise. So let's now try to answer some of the questions that many of you, no doubt, are asking after the U.S. strikes on Iran. What happens now for Iran? What happens now in the broader Middle East? Will this escalate? Is there an off ramp?

There's a lot of questions. Let's get some answers with somebody who's been right at the center of all the high-stakes diplomacy in the region. Joining us now is Amos Haxton. He is managing partner at TWG Global, also a former senior Biden advisor who negotiated directly with Middle East leaders and some not so nice people and some of the region's most sensitive issues. So almost really a pleasure to have you on what is, as you see it, and I know there's a lot of speculation that goes into this, the off ramp here. What's the end game? Hey, Brian, it's really great to be with you. Look, the off ramp is clear. is, is there a new regime that comes, who's in charge of Iran?

Nobody knows the answer to that question now, because the Iranians are trying to figure that out for themselves. You have the Ali La Rajani, you have a few others. The IRGC is trying to figure out, are they going to be the power player here? But somebody's going to emerge as the leader that will be selected by the internal chaos that's happening inside Iran. Once they figure that out, you can start talking about what's an off-ramp. And the off ramp is, one, do you have a new leadership that says we're uninterested,

we are no longer interested in nuclear weapons, we're no longer interested in exporting violence to the proxies around the region? We may not be pro-America, pro-West, but we're not really going to be pursuing the same objectives as we were before, and then you get to an end of this conflict. Or does Israel or the United States say, no, we need to have a self-sor-hand-picked leader like Venezuela with Delci. That's a lot harder to see in the context of Iran. The third option is that without troops on the ground and an actual occupation of Iran, very hard to imagine, or it's easy to imagine a chaotic situation where you have a number of centers of power that emerge,

and that's similar to what we have in Libya, right? A government that's essentially in the east, in Benghazi, another government that is in Tripoli, and then tribal powers that are in between. That could happen as well. That's why it's so fluid now. And I look at all these people predicting what's going to happen. I don't think anybody knows what happens. And Amos, Talima, told us to ask you the following question, which is an excellent one, I want to ask you now. What do you think Israel, those three scenarios, which is they pick their leader, there's a kind of a Delci type, or there's a tribal kind of result here. What do you think is Israel's goal here? And is Israel and the U.S. aligned in the same end goal here, or might they have a broader one?

Israel is much more prescriptive of what they want, which they don't say publicly, but what they're looking for is a regime that they can work with. They're not likely to be all that enamored with someone who is associated with the current regime saying the right words because they won't trust it. They would like to see a opposition figure, even though there's no such thing as the opposition in Iran, but someone who is really going to say, I'm going to renew relations with Israel, I'll have a good relationship with the White House, that's what they really want. I'm not sure that that's what the Trump administration will see as the only end. But Amos, doesn't Israel itself know that that would be, that there is no existing alternative

to either the theocracy, I guess you'd call it, or the monarchy that was in place before. Now, there is this National Council of Resistance with Miriam Rajavi, and maybe, maybe, but they're building from the ground. How do you dislodge the entire kind of clerical regime that has ruled the country for 40 plus years? Well, first, my arm, Rajavir was a designated terrorist by the U.S. government and U.S. intelligence agency. So I don't know that they are all that welcomed by the Iranian protesters. That's not who they're looking for. I think that you're right on the base of the question.

The Israelis have a tendency to be very of late, and even historically, of being very good at dismantling, decapitating, and destroying some of their enemies. Not as good a track record when it comes to putting together an opposition that will be in charge. Look at Gaza, look at Lebanon, et cetera, where that's always been, has never worked out all that well. And I think it's very difficult to do that, even when you do have occupying forces, the way we did in Iraq, let alone if you're doing this from the air. And I think that's where you may get to divergent interest between Israel and the United States as to when to end this. And you've been talking about the oil prices.

Look, don't underestimate what that could mean for American decision making. And don't take the first day or two as an indicator either. Remember that after the day of the Russian invasion to Ukraine, oil prices went up less than 5%, 3.5%, 4%. And that was in a very tight oil market. But fast forward two months, when things lasted a lot longer than people expected, oil went to 124 from 100. Is that possible here? Is that almost, is that possible here? 100%.

I think we're discounting a number of, the Iranians still have tools. They hit the LNG terminal. They hit the refinery in Saudi. What if it wasn't a refinery but a production site? The minute you do that, you know this, Brian, panic ensues. So for now, oil prices are going up not that much because they went up, what, 15% over the last month in anticipation of this. So a lot was priced in already. We were at $60 brand or 58, and now we're at, you know, 77.

But that's without any real physical damage and only insurance damage. But if you get to a strike that actually takes something out and people see on TV, traders are started to see flames on TV, it always changes. It doesn't always have to happen on the first day, but it's about how long does this last? And what is the Iranian capacity to lengthen this conflict and to continue to inflict damage? So far they can inflict damage in the Gulf. So we'll have to see about that. Yeah.

So let's very quickly, I want to end with the straight of four moves. I know we've focused a lot on this, but you would agree, and our viewers know that this is the critical choke point for not just oil. And I want to be clear, it's not just about oil. We're looking at a live map, all little red dots and arrows. Those are oil, gas, or chemical tankers. It's not just a choke point for oil, as you know almost. It is natural gas. It is also chemicals and fertilizers.

30% of the world's chemical fertilizers, urea's, phosphates, whatever, they go through there as well. so people, it matters a lot to eating. So if you were still in the White House, what would the recommendation be to get this flowing again? Would it be some kind of U.S. naval escort through it? Would it be try to get the insurers to agree to something, some kind of a multi-day potential ceasefire? How do we get those ships moving again?

So it's a great point because that's what I'd be watching right now really carefully. and that's what we did ahead of the Russian invasion when oil prices increased, or after Libya in 2011. I think you have to look at a couple of things. One, right now, the Iranians cannot close the Strait of Hermos physically, but you don't need that.

You need the insurance companies to not put a ban on traveling through. So I think I would look, the SPR doesn't help you all that much if you're going to be blocking 25% to 30% of oil flow worldwide, right? So I think what you need to do is look at what are the alternatives to put pressure on the insurance companies, other financial guarantees that I can work with the tanker companies to be able to get them to start moving again. Because I need to get momentum that at least if some tankers start to go through and nothing happens,

and we can get some momentum of clearing one lane, talking to the Department of Defense to make sure that we put some air defense against missiles, and UAVs specific to that area, just like we're defending our bases, we should be defending that choke points. I would start looking. I wouldn't implement anything today. I'd wait a couple of days and see how this develops,

but if I have to, don't wait too long if you're the White House, because if the market decides this is going on too long that I have a physical shortage in the market now, this could be a runaway train that goes from, oh, it's only up a couple of bucks to it's up $25. mistake amos to look to i won't use the word drain uh to not have a a a bountiful spr right now regardless of of whom was responsible for that decision i was responsible for that so i take full responsibility i think was the right one uh we had a war that was going on and oil prices went

to 1202 and we were about to go back into a deep recession as a result and it worked oil prices went down to below 100 and ultimately to 85 there is still plenty of spr uh to be able to do a release and we purchase back a lot and I think that we should continue purchasing every time price is low. I think we have plenty of SPR, but you have to use it in the right way at the right time. Responding to 20% of the market being off because of her moves, the SPR is not built to do that for long. So I would look at other options to be able to do that and then look at SPR as using that to augment that when I need it. Amazing. Amazing. How many people are, well, you know, maybe we should.

I made that decision. I stand by it. And anyway, Amos, appreciate it very much. One of the greatest oil trades of all time? That's what, listen. We sold at 95. We purchased at 76. You're sure we're not going to regret? Are we going to regret it? I guess. I don't know. Maybe it's too late now. I don't know what else can we make. Can we force oil companies to fill it at a discount if we had to? I don't know. We got to go. Almost thank you.

For another time. Yeah. Thank you. Really appreciate it. Appreciate to Amos Hoxstein joining us there. Bitcoin, ether, Solana, all moving higher. Jan Veneck is coming back. We're going to talk crypto right after the break. Welcome back. New development this hour is the Dow has now gone positive,

joining the S&P and the NASDAQ in that territory, as all the major averages have staged a huge comeback. The Dow just turned positive. It's up 32 points, half a percent gain for the NASDAQ now. A little bit of a tell was the moved in crypto all day long. Bitcoin up 6 percent now on pace for its best day in nearly a week. Jan Vannek is CEO of Vanek funds. We've talked Bitcoin many a time over the years.

A little bit of a tell for the market action today. It finally is getting a bit. Do you glean anything from that? Not particularly. I think what's more interesting to me is actually that it's the complex wide move. So it's not just Bitcoin, but it's the whole crypto ecosystem, including the large caps, coin base, and Circle. I can speculate about that a little bit, Kelly.

I mean, it's really just a one-day move, so who knows. But one-to-one things forward to some kind of solution with Iran. How are you going to move money around? And I do think it's a very, very crypto-friendly region, U.I.E., Dubai, everything. So it could be that if we wanted to move money to good actors, we would want to use crypto-payment rails, as opposed to going through decrepit Iranian banks that we don't control and that are very weak financially. So, I mean, that's a theory. That's an interesting point.

Yeah. I think and do about, okay, we have had a hard time getting the whole complex to rally until circles earnings and how it was a stable coin that ignited so much excitement again. The plumbing of this does seem to be the most promising part. You know, it just feels like it continued evolution in crypto. Yeah, I think I think 2026, this is our Van Ecc thesis, a little bit, is the year of the corporate chain wars. Now, I'll tell you what I mean by that.

Blockchain's are shortened to chain. And it used to be, okay, what am I going to use? to be the transaction mechanism for Wall Street in the future? Is it going to be Ethereum? Is it going to be Solana? And then a lot of people were starting their own chains. And so those are the open decentralized chains. It's called decentralized.

In 26, it's not that. It's the corporations, the financial companies, including the J.P. Morgans of the world, that like blockchain for 24-7, for visibility, transparency, cross-collateralization. So all the benefits, but guess what? They want to control it. it, right? It's got to be the JPMorgan chain or the Circle Network or or Coinbases.

They didn't even have a like a crypto chain. So, so that's where we're at. As a user, frankly, don't want just to be trapped. Like no one, no real crypto person wants to be trapped in a corporate chain. But it doesn't matter. That's the market fight that's happening right now for stable coins, which continue to explode in importance. Circles up 55% in the past week, which is wild. agree with your point on stable coins. A good question would be, if stable coins are becoming so widely adopted, which they are, do we need Bitcoin? Does it have a purpose? Well, that's why I said the whole ecosystem was rallying today because... But we're still down over 50% from our highs of last October. Right. So, you know, our view coming into 26 is that Bitcoin is governed by the two

things you know about Bitcoin, limited supply at $21 million and the happening cycle where the Bitcoin miners who run the network get paid half the number of Bitcoin every four years. There's been an investing cycle. Bitcoin goes up three years in a row, goes down pretty massively in that fourth year. 2026 is that fourth year. So that's why we're in a crypto bare market, excuse me. So I don't think we can overcomplicate it. Now, I think we're making a bottom, and this is a very nice sign of life.

So, yeah, that's where I think we're at. So the real tell is 2027. For all those out there, Jose, when are you five? We may get a rally later in this year. But you need three to six months to work through a bear market, right? And, you know, maybe in another quarter or so. All right. Jan, thanks.

Appreciate all your time today. It's good to have you here. Jan Vaneck from Vanek funds. All right, let's now get over to Angelica People for a CBC News Update. Hey, Brian. Well, police in Austin, Texas say local and federal investigators are looking for a motive in a deadly shooting at a bar early Sunday, but that the probe is still in its early hours. They say two young people were killed in the gunfire and another 14 were injured.

Sources confirmed to MS now today that the shooter was wearing a property of Allah sweatshirt at the time of the shooting, and the FBI is investigating the attacks as a potential act of terrorism. In arguments earlier today, Supreme Court justices appeared to be skeptical about a federal law that bars people who consume illegal drugs from owning guns. The Justice Department is defending the law, which gun rights advocates say violates the Second Amendment. And more than 150 lawmakers introduced a new bill today that would reinstate the IRS's direct file program, which allowed eligible Americans to complete their taxes online for free and directly with the government. The Trump administration said last April that the program would be ending because it wasn't widely used.

Brian, back over you. All right, Angelica, thank you very much. Right, coming up, some of the days, other big movers, including that's, stock. It's an electric utility. It's on pace for its worst day, worst day in 20 years. Think you know? Tweet Kelly. We're back right after this. Welcome back. Let's take a look at stocks that are on the move, starting with the utility name that obstreperus correctly guessed on X. Congratulations. Worst day in 20 years. Did Dom Choo, what can you tell us? All right. So this is it. The mystery chart, right? You guys talked about it. The list here, the force performing stock in the S&P 500 is AES, the

Power generation, clean energy utility companies, lower by roughly 17%. Now, it agreed to be taken private in a buyout transaction for $15 a share. That's $11 billion, roughly. AES closed at north of $17 a share at the end of last week. The consortium of buyers is being led by BlackRock's global infrastructure partners and natural gas company EQT, seen as a bigger bet on future electricity demand that will help power the boom in AI. And we'll end with some of the real bright spots in trading today. Not in the best way, though.

The conflict in the Middle East has put defense contractors back in full focus. Companies like Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, RTX, among the best performers in the market, alongside Axon, which is viewed as a play on drone technology by some investors. And then the defense contracting giant Palantir on the software side, AI play, balancing today after underperforming the last few months on this AI sell-off. So keep in out of all this defense names, guys. I'll send things back over to you. All right, Dominic Chute, thank you very much.

Now, from stocks to the bond markets, Treasury's actually. rebounding following a big move lower 10 year yield breaking below 4% earlier. It is not quite there yet. It's at 4.05%. The market move, the bond market move. Rick Santelli, joining us now, I'm kind of, I feel like more of a broken record, Rick, but I know we broke below 4%. We didn't stay there for very long.

We're just kind of passing through. Yeah, no, and I'll tell you, even without all the geopolitical incentives to propel yields one way or the other, we might not have been much different. We have one session closed under 4% for this year. There was nine of those last year. It's tough to keep it down there. Look at twos and tens. They're both up 11 basis points,

which means there's nothing going on with regard to yield curve vibrations there. And that's something important. Usually flight to safety is mostly a steepening event, which pushes short rates down. So there's a lot of moving parts here. Yes, there's inflationary pressure. due to energy, maybe the cost of war.

But the fact that we were at a three and a half year close on twos, and the fact that we were at a one and a half year closing low yield on tens really does explain some of the power in reversing the move. And not only that, the dollar index is having a huge day as well. Not only is it up on the year should have closed here, it would be a six-week high close. Follow that dollar. I think the dollar is portraying that investors,

you know, they're looking at geopolitics and so far, not as concerned as they could be with negatives that could come from this conflict. Back to you. We'll see if those assert themselves, the more it drags on or goes on. Rick, thank you very much. More Power Lunch after this. Thanks for watching, Power Lunch. Historic Day, big turnaround.

Closing bell starts right now.