Oil's 7% slide steals the show as Wall Street grinds higher

US equities ended the session marginally higher, the Nasdaq Composite adding 0.7% to lead, the S&P 500 up 0.3% and the Dow up 0.3%. Overshadowing all of it, Brent crude sank 7.2% to about $85.6 a barrel and US WTI dropped 5% to roughly $80.8 — the day's defining move across any asset class.

The action away from New York was to the downside. Asia fell sharply: Hong Kong's Hang Seng closed down 1.9%, South Korea's Kospi off 2.5% and Shenzhen's Component down 2.5%, while Tokyo's Nikkei 225 slipped 0.2%. Europe was mixed — Frankfurt's DAX rose 0.6% and London's FTSE 100 added 0.3%, but Paris's CAC 40 dipped 0.2%.

The oil rout was the day's clearest story. Crude had been elevated on fears of supply disruption from the US–Iran standoff; those fears drained away as signs of possible diplomatic progress emerged and a fresh round of US sanctions on Iran landed softer than the market had braced for. Some profit-taking after a strong run added to the slide — even after today, Brent sits around 41% higher on the year.

US equities, by contrast, largely shrugged off new trade friction, with Canada unveiling retaliatory tariffs on roughly $20bn of American goods due to take effect on 8 September. The bigger support was in rates: Treasury yields fell across the curve, the 10-year down 6.5 basis points to 4.64%, which typically flatters richly valued growth names — and duly, technology led the tape while cheaper oil hammered energy.

Asia's weakness is harder to pin on one catalyst. The Kospi's 2.5% drop follows an extraordinary run — it is still up more than 50% year-to-date — so this reads more as profit-taking in 2026's biggest winners than a clean fundamental shift.

The mood was calm rather than defensive: the VIX eased 2.5% to 15.45, deep in untroubled territory, and rates volatility as measured by the MOVE index slipped to around 72. Yet the advance was narrow, not broad — technology (the XLK ETF up 0.9%) did the heavy lifting, while energy (-1.7%) and consumer staples (-1.1%) lagged. Underneath the equity gains ran a quietly cautious current: bonds rallied, the dollar index softened to 98.9, and gold added 1.7% to about $4,719, all of which usually signals hedging rather than full-throated risk appetite.

The data point of note printed this morning: the Conference Board's consumer confidence index fell to 89.4 in August (from a downwardly revised 90.2), its weakest reading since January, released at 10:00 ET, with the drop driven by souring views on the labour market and inflation. On trade, Canada confirmed retaliatory tariffs on around $20bn of US goods, effective 8 September.

Nothing else of consequence is still due today. The week's set-piece is the Jackson Hole symposium on 27–29 August, where new Fed chair Kevin Warsh makes his first appearance in the role — markets will parse every word for the rate path. Nvidia's results, also due this week, are the other marquee event.

Intuit was the after-hours story: the TurboTax and Credit Karma owner beat on fiscal fourth-quarter earnings but guided FY2027 below expectations, and the shares fell roughly 7% in extended trade — a familiar 'good quarter, cautious outlook' punishment. Zoom, Heico and Semtech also reported after the bell, while Dick's Sporting Goods and Canadian lenders Bank of Montreal and Bank of Nova Scotia had reported before the open.