2026.4.8 US Stock Market Daily

The Dow surged 1,325 points as all three major indexes soared nearly 3%. Per Tavily’s consolidated reporting, Trump walked back his threat of a large-scale military strike on Iran, a US-Iran ceasefire was reached, and global equities staged a violent rebound. Nasdaq closed at 22,634.99, up 2.80%. Dow hit 47,909.92, up 2.85%. S&P 500 finished at 6,782.81, up 2.51%. VIX settled at 21.04, down 18.39% on the day.

Oil was the direct price discovery of the ceasefire. WTI crude crashed 13.71% to $97.46, reportedly dipping below $95 intraday. Supply-recovery expectations from the ceasefire were released all at once.

But Polymarket’s data threw cold water on the rally. The US-Iran ceasefire by April 7 was confirmed at 100%, yet the probability of the conflict fully ending by April 7 stood at just 45%, rising only to 58% by April 15. The probability of the Strait of Hormuz returning to normal passage by end of April was a mere 26%. Odds of a US invasion of Iran before year-end: 32%. The gap between a ceasefire and ending a war — prediction markets see it more clearly than equities do.

Sector performance followed a textbook risk-on script. Industrials XLI led the way at +3.75%, Materials XLB +3.33%, Tech XLK +3.10%, Consumer Discretionary XLY +2.83%. Ten of eleven major sectors rose, with the sole decliner being Energy XLE at -3.51% — the oil crash punched straight through the geopolitical premium that had been propping up the sector. This divergence itself was pricing in a single trade: geopolitical risk cools → oil falls → inflation expectations reprice lower → rate-sensitive assets re-rate.

The 10-year Treasury yield dipped to 4.29%, and the dollar index fell to 99.09. Both signals point the same direction: safe-haven demand is receding, money is flowing out of the dollar and the short end. But the limited magnitude of the yield decline doesn’t match the equity euphoria — the bond market hasn’t relaxed its inflation vigilance. This week’s CPI print still looms overhead. March happened to be the month when energy prices spiked hardest, and even with oil pulling back now, the March month-over-month data is already locked in.

Asia-Pacific markets didn’t follow this time. Per Wall Street Journal China, the Shanghai Composite fell 0.77%, the Shenzhen Component and ChiNext dropped over 1%, the Hang Seng opened down 0.53%, and the Nikkei slid 0.6%. US stocks surging while Asia-Pacific fell — the time lag is the primary driver: ceasefire news hadn’t been fully digested by Asian close. But it also reflects deeper skepticism in Asian markets about the ceasefire’s durability. Spain has already publicly urged Israel to cease fire on “all fronts,” with de-escalation signals spreading at the international level.

The S&P closed at 6,782.81, failing to clear the 6,800 round-number level. After consecutive days of surging, ceasefire expectations are now fully priced in. What matters next comes down to two things: first, actual shipping-lane restoration at the Strait of Hormuz (Polymarket gives just 26% odds of normalization by month-end); second, whether this week’s CPI overshoots on the back of March’s oil spike. If the strait remains restricted and CPI surprises to the upside, oil prices and risk-off sentiment could snap back at any moment.