Finance

Crude oil benchmarks experienced upward pressure at the end of the week, with Brent crude rising over 1% to settle near $88.50 per barrel. Market anxiety increased following reports that a commercial tanker faced an attack while leaving the Persian Gulf, raising ongoing supply chain and maritime security concerns regarding Iran.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq underperformed other benchmarks due to a broad retreat in artificial intelligence and chipmaking equities. Despite delivering an upbeat quarterly outlook, Applied Materials saw its shares drop over 5% as investors took profits amid highly elevated sector valuations, dragging competitors like Broadcom and Intel lower.

The digital asset market failed to benefit from macroeconomic tailwinds as Bitcoin fell below the $63,000 threshold and Ethereum moved lower. Investor sentiment was negatively impacted after the Securities and Exchange Commission abruptly canceled a scheduled open meeting meant to vote on new capital-raising guidelines and tokenization regulations.