The S&P 500 climbed 0.8% as U.S. stocks run toward the finish of a third straight week of big gains, their longest such streak since Halloween. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 678 points, or 1.4%, as of 9:35 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1% higher.
Stocks have jumped more than 11% since hitting a bottom in late March on hopes that the United States and Iran can avoid a worst-case scenario for the global economy despite their war. The reopening of the Strait of Hormuz is the clearest yet signal for optimism, and President Trump said in a speech late Thursday that the war " should be ending pretty soon."
The price for a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude tumbled 10.8% to $81.28.
Brent crude, the international standard, dropped 10.3% to $89.13. To be sure, it remains above its $70 level from before the war, indicating some caution is still embedded in financial markets.
A strong start to the earnings reporting season for big U.S. companies has also helped to support the U.S. stock market, and several more financial companies joined the list Friday of companies delivering bigger profits for the start of 2026 than analysts expected.
