Tuesday was the kind of day Wall Street had been desperate for since February 28. The Dow Jones jumped 1,125 points, the S&P 500 surged 2.91%, and the Nasdaq advanced 3.83% — each index posting its biggest single-day gain since May — after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian signalled publicly that Tehran has the “necessary will” to end the conflict.
Pezeshkian’s comments, made during a phone call with European Council President António Costa, were specific enough to move markets dramatically but vague enough that analysts immediately began hedging. He said Iran was ready to end the war provided it received “the necessary guarantees to prevent repetition of the aggression” — conditions that remain far from agreed upon.
The S&P 500 at 6,528.52 recovered approximately 30% of its total drawdown since the war began, adding roughly $1.7 trillion in market capitalisation in a single session, a staggering number even by the standards of the most volatile market environment in years.
“What we’ve seen from a messaging standpoint from the administration is a bit of indication they may start to either wind down or pivot,” said Alonso Munoz, CIO at Hamilton Capital Partners. “You get these periods where the market gets so oversold that you just have relief rallies on any indication that there’s good news.”
Oil told a more sober story, however. Brent crude settled up nearly 5% at $118.35 per barrel on the same day stocks surged — the oil market simultaneously pricing a possible diplomatic off-ramp in equities and a fresh attack on a Kuwaiti tanker in Dubai waters. Two markets processing the same information and reaching opposite conclusions is a vivid demonstration of how different risk frameworks are operating simultaneously right now.
The month of March overall was among the worst in recent memory for US equities, with the S&P 500 falling approximately 7% across Q1 2026 — its worst quarter since 2022 — while the energy sector recorded its best quarterly gain on record.
Warren Buffett told CNBC’s Becky Quick on Tuesday that while he would be interested in buying more Apple at the right price, “not in this market” — a disciplined response that captured the mood of institutional investors navigating relief rallies built on uncertain diplomatic signals.
