US stocks and oil prices flip-flop ahead of Trump’s deadline to bomb Iranian power plants

Patrick McKeon, center, works on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig) 2026-04-06T02:46:22Z NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is making only hesitant moves Monday, while oil prices are flip-flopping ahead of a deadline that President Donald Trump has set to bomb Iranian power plants.

The S&P 500 edged up by 0.3% in midday trading, coming off its first winning week in the last six .

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 100 points, or 0.2%, as of 12:30 p.m.

Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% higher.

Oil prices likewise seesawed between gains and losses amid continued uncertainty about what will happen in the war with Iran and how long it will slow the global flow of oil and natural gas.

Iran on Monday rejected the latest ceasefire proposal and instead said it wants a permanent end to the war, though the talks may not have collapsed. “We won’t merely accept a ceasefire,” Mojtaba Ferdousi Pour, head of the Iranian diplomatic mission in Cairo, told The Associated Press. “We only accept an end of the war with guarantees that we won’t be attacked again.” Fighting is continuing, meanwhile, including an Israeli attack on an Iranian petrochemical plant.

And in the background is the clock ticking toward a deadline, which Trump has moved multiple times, where he has threatened to attack Iran’s infrastructure if it does not open the Strait of Hormuz .

A fifth of the world’s oil typically sails through the strait during peacetime. “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran,” Trump said on his social media network over the weekend, threatening Iranian leaders that “you’ll be living in Hell - JUST WATCH!” Read More Monday also offered the first chance for U.S. stock prices to react to a report from Friday that said U.S. employers hired more workers last month than economists expected.

The unemployment rate unexpectedly improved.

They’re encouraging signals for an economy that’s had to absorb painful leaps in costs for gasoline since the war’s beginning.

The average price for a gallon of regular gasoline is nearly $4.12 across the country, according to AAA.

It was below $3 a couple days before the United States and Israel launched attacks to begin the war in late February.

For countries that don’t produce as much oil as the United States, the pain has been even worse.

That’s because they are more reliant on oil coming from the Middle East, a

原文链接: AP News