Axios

The escalating war between Israel and Iran jolted oil prices higher and sent investors rushing to the safety of gold heading into the weekend.

The latest: Iran launched a counterattack against Israel just hours ago, firing around 150 missiles in two initial barrages.

• That came 18 hours after Israel attacked Iran's nuclear facilities and missile sites and killed dozens of top military leaders and nuclear scientists.

📈 Market impact: While oil has come down from earlier highs on the day, crude futures were still up over 8% late in the afternoon.

• Spot gold prices rose 1.6% to $3,433, hovering just below an all-time high in April.

David Sacks, the venture capitalist advising President Trump on crypto and AI policy, is apparently divesting his holdings in foundational AI companies and hyperscalers like xAI and Meta, according to a White House memo posted online Friday.

• The White House previously disclosed that Sacks and his firm, Craft Ventures, divested around $200 million of crypto-related assets.

Why it matters: Sacks entered the Trump administration with a slew of investments that could have created conflicts of interest, or at least perceptions of them, but has taken steps to minimize that risk.

Major retailers, including Walmart and Amazon, are reportedly considering their own stablecoin offerings as legislation to regulate the instruments moves further through Congress.

The big picture: For big retail, it's the latest opportunity in a long-running hunt to cut billions in costs and days of delays tied to payment transactions.

Israel's strikes against Iranian military leadership and nuclear facilities open up a new wave of risks for an already precarious global economy.

The big picture: Global financial markets Friday morning displayed classic flight-to-safety, risk-off moves — with some wrinkles that suggest the onset of new conflict in the Middle East could act as a stagflationary force for the rest of the world.

Consumer sentiment rebounded in early June as tariff anxiety subsided, according to preliminary results from the University of Michigan.

Why it matters: It was the first improvement in six months, with a more upbeat economic outlook evident across all demographics and political groups.

It's Friday the 13th, so make sure to toss salt over your shoulder, watch out for ladders, knock on various pieces of wood — oh, and maybe buy some stocks too.

Why it matters: Believe it or not, the stock market tends to do better on Friday the 13th than other days.

Call it zombie management: Each week, federal workers inside a few agencies still dutifully email a report, detailing the five things they did in the previous seven days.

Why it matters: The emails, born from an out-of-nowhere Elon Musk X post, show how hard it can be undo even the smallest of changes once unleashed on the largest workforce in the U.S.

The latest U.S. trade deal with China may let the economy take a brief breather, but it's far from being able to relax.

Why it matters: Months of real-time uncertainty are being replaced with longer-term uncertainty, with trade policy living on three-to-six-month cycles that make business planning a nightmare.

President Trump's website for his "gold card" that would enable successful applicants to buy U.S. permanent residency for $5 million went live this week.

The big picture: Details on what the program would entail remain scant, and it may require congressional approval.