Axios

Oil prices surged about 9% Monday to roughly $83 per barrel after President Trump claimed the U.S. was reinstating a naval blockade on Iran, adding to gains already driven by renewed hostilities over the weekend.

Why it matters: Higher oil prices typically feed into higher gasoline prices, potentially pushing the national average back toward $4 per gallon.

The Federal Reserve's grand headquarters building on the National Mall has been a source of controversy over the last year — and not for the first time.

• An episode from the 1940s, which the Fed's official historians wrote about last week, shows how the building has long been part of fraught debates around central bank independence.

Corporate America is getting an accidental stimulus. Billions of dollars collected through court-invalidated tariffs are flowing back to businesses confronting stubborn cost pressures.

Why it matters: The refunds amount to a reversal of the tariff shock that squeezed profits and raised prices in the first place.

• Companies that have discussed their plans say they generally expect to use the money to offset inflation rather than generate much new economic activity. Many will absorb higher costs tied to the Iran war and future tariffs — and, in some cases, cut consumer prices.

The U.S. IPO market will set a new record by the end of this week, and the biggest AI IPOs remain in the offing.

Why it matters: We've just crossed into the second half of the year.

The market's giant winners this year — memory-related stocks — also look ridiculously cheap.

Why it matters: Their low price-to-earnings multiples reflect the market's worries that the current boom times won't last.

A former Ku Klux Klan hall in Texas is becoming an arts center — one of several racist landmarks across the U.S. that communities are trying to turn from symbols of terror into sites of reparation.

Why it matters: Years after the backlash against Confederate monuments, new fights have emerged over what to do with remaining physical reminders of particularly hurtful racism — tear them down, preserve them, reinterpret them or return them to communities harmed by them.