05/18/2026 Weekly analysis
Over the past few weeks, financial markets have been dealing with a rather unusual situation. On the one hand, there was an open war in the Middle East, the Strait of Hormuz was blocked, and oil was clearly trading above $100 a barrel. On the other, stock markets kept hitting record highs, especially in the United States, as if all of that were merely temporary noise with no real ability to alter the macroeconomic outlook.
However, the April inflation data in the United States provided a pretty serious wake-up call for investors.