Wall Street Lunch: U.S. Authorizes Iranian Oil Sales

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Stocks retract (0:15), U.S. authorizes Iranian oil sales (0:40), Options flashing growing concern (2:20) and Micron partners with Anthropic (4:13)

Transcript

Wall Street’s major averages were mixed on Monday after negotiations for a peace deal between the U.S. and Iran almost fell through during the weekend. In addition, big tech stocks struggled.

The Trump administration has issued a temporary license allowing Iran to sell some of its energy exports through August 21 following “productive talks” between the U.S. and Iran, Treasury Secretary Bessent said Monday, opening the door for eventually ending many sanctions programs as part of negotiations between the two countries.

The waiver allows the U.S. to import Iranian crude oil and other petrochemical and petroleum products, which the U.S. has not done on any meaningful level since imposing measures after the 1979 revolution, and that Iran can be paid in dollars, a boon for the country which is in desperate need of foreign exchange.

“This waiver doesn’t just weaken the pressure campaign, it puts it into reverse,” Obsidian Risk Advisors managing principal Brett Erickson told Bloomberg.

Shipowners, traders, and buyers will now have to evaluate whether they have time to source, finance, and complete such purchases after years of not dealing with Iran because of sanctions.

Vice President Vance said “great progress” was made during the talks in Switzerland, despite Iran’s declaration over the weekend that it had closed the Strait of Hormuz, and that Iran has agreed to allow weapons inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency back into the country.

Vance said Iran’s invite to IAEA inspectors was a “major milestone and the first step in “permanently ending a nuclear weapons program in Iran,” but IAEA director general Rafael Grossi – who is attending the talks in Switzerland – has not commented.

The benchmark S&P 500 (SP500) was last -0.3%, while the Nasdaq Composite (COMP:IND) traded -1.1%, and the blue-chip Dow (DJI) was +0.3%.

Treasury yields were higher, with the 10-year Treasury yield (US10Y) 5 basis points higher at 4.51%, while the 2-year Treasury yield (US2Y) rose 4 basis points to 4.23%.

Crude oil futures (CL1:COM) were at $73, while Brent (CO1:COM) was $77 per barrel.

Options markets are flashing growing concern about the stability of technology stocks, particularly companies tied to the artificial intelligence boom, according to Apollo’s chief economist, Torsten Slok.

Slok noted that a key measure of Nasdaq (COMP:IND) volatility relative to the broader S&P 500 (SP500) has climbed to its highest level in years, highlighting a sharp divergence in how investors are pricing risk across the equity market.

The move suggests traders are increasingly seeking protection against potential swings in technology shares, even as broader market volatility remains comparatively subdued.

The widening gap indicates that market participants view the greatest vulnerability as concentrated within growth-oriented and AI-linked stocks rather than the overall market.

Demand for downside protection in the Nasdaq has accelerated, reflecting concerns that elevated valuations and crowded positioning could leave parts of the technology sector exposed to a period of heightened turbulence.

At the same time, the relatively calm volatility profile of the S&P 500 suggests investors are not anticipating a broad-based market selloff. Instead, current options pricing points to fears of a more targeted shakeout centered on high-growth technology names.

The trend underscores how investor sentiment has become increasingly dependent on a narrow group of AI-related companies that have played a major role in driving recent market gains.

Now, here are 4 news stories that broke in the morning to watch out for:

AbbVie acquires Apogee: AbbVie (ABBV) has agreed to acquire Apogee Therapeutics (APGE) in an all-cash deal valued at $135.11 per share, totaling approximately $10.9 billion in equity value. The transaction is expected to strengthen AbbVie’s immunology franchise and expand its presence in respiratory diseases, including atopic dermatitis and asthma. APGE shares rallied 52% in early trading on the news. The deal, expected to close in the third quarter of 2026, adds Apogee’s pipeline of clinical-stage treatments for inflammatory and immunological diseases, including lead asset zumilokibart, a subcutaneous half-life extended monoclonal antibody targeting IL-13.

Micron partners with Anthropic: Micron Technology (MU) and Anthropic have announced a collaboration to develop memory and storage infrastructure optimized for artificial intelligence workloads. Micron shares popped up 5% during early market trading on the news. The partnership establishes Micron as Anthropic’s primary memory and storage component supplier and will research how memory and storage subsystems perform across AI training and inference workloads.

Meta invests in Cred: Meta Platforms (META) has acquired a 20% stake in Indian fintech firm Cred in a $900 million investment that values the platform at $4.5 billion. As part of the deal, Cred founder Kunal Shah will assume the role of head of WhatsApp, replacing Will Cathcart, who is moving to a new AI-focused role at Meta. Cred operates an app that rewards users for paying credit card bills on time. Meta described Shah as “one of India’s most respected entrepreneurs” who brings a deep understanding of how WhatsApp is woven into people’s daily lives.

Nvidia (NVDA) was in focus Monday as Dell Technologies (DELL) and Super Micro Computer (SMCI) unveiled new artificial intelligence servers with the tech giant’s Vera Rubin line of GPUs.

Nvidia also noted that Vera Rubin and its Vera CPU lines would be coming to other server makers and would be available for other science work, such as climate modeling or energy exploration.

Coinbase Global (COIN) is now said to be offering traders pre-IPO perpetual futures tied to Anthropic (ANTHRO) and OpenAI (OPENAI).

Earlier this month, the crypto exchange was letting traders make risky bets on SpaceX’s (SPCX) future share prices through the so-called ‘pre-IPO perpetual futures’, Reuters had reported.

The derivatives did not have a direct link to the underlying shares but were priced with reference to SpaceX’s latest disclosed pre-IPO valuation, the newswire had said.