Shares of major U.S. banks moved higher after President Donald Trump canceled military strikes against Iran that had been planned for later in the evening.
JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM) rose 1.5%, Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) gained 1.2%, Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) added 1%, and Citigroup (NYSE:C) climbed 2.8%. Investment banks also advanced, with Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) up 2.2% and Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) higher by 2.1%.
The market moves followed Mr. Trump’s decision to call off the strikes. Earlier, the president had said the United States would hit Iran "very hard tonight" and signaled interest in striking Iran’s oil infrastructure hub at Kharg Island. Those remarks came after a second day of exchanges of strikes by both sides in the Gulf, a sequence of events that had raised concerns about a return to full-scale conflict.
Traders reacted in the session that followed the cancelled operation, with major bank names posting gains across both commercial and investment banking franchises. The share-price moves were noted across the large-cap financial sector, as measured by the individual bank performances listed above.
The unfolding sequence of threats and the subsequent cancellation represents a rapid change in the immediate geopolitical risk picture that market participants were watching closely. The earlier statements about potential targeting of energy infrastructure and the reports of strikes in the Gulf were part of the events that prompted heightened concern about broader escalation.
Information in this article is limited to the reported market moves and the publicly stated comments by the president, together with the reported second day of strikes in the Gulf. Where detail is not provided in the source material, those limits are reflected in this account rather than expanded upon.
Data reported in this article:
- JPMorgan Chase (JPM): +1.5%
- Bank of America (BAC): +1.2%
- Wells Fargo (WFC): +1.0%
- Citigroup (C): +2.8%
- Goldman Sachs (GS): +2.2%
- Morgan Stanley (MS): +2.1%