Shares were mixed in Europe and Asia on Monday, with big gains for computer chipmakers and other tech stocks after Friday’s rally on Wall Street.
Oil prices rebounded and Brent crude climbed more than $2 a barrel as the U.S. launched an effort early Monday to guide ships out of the Strait of Hormuz. Iran rejected the plan but was reviewing the U.S. response to its latest proposal to end the war, Iran’s judiciary Mizan news agency cited Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei saying Sunday.
The price of a barrel of U.S. benchmark crude was up $1.80 at $103.73 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, jumped $2.23 to $110.40 a barrel.
The oil market “remains the fulcrum, [of the market] with hundreds of tankers, bulk carriers, and cargo ships still stranded across the Gulf, idling as storage constraints force producers to shut … production simply because there is nowhere left to store it,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management said in a commentary.
Thousands of seafarers, many on oil tankers or cargo ships, have been stuck in the Persian Gulf since the war began, describing to The Associated Press seeing intercepted drones and missiles explode over the waters as their vessels run low on drinking water, food and other supplies.
Trump said what he called “Project Freedom” would begin Monday morning in the Middle East. The U.S. Central Command said it would involve guided-missile destroyers, more than 100 aircraft and 15,000 service members, but the Pentagon did not immediately answer questions about how they would be deployed.
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