U.S. stock futures are down this morning as markets absorbed weekend events that made it clear the Iran war is not over.

• The price of Brent oil futures, which took a historic plunge on Friday are now back up 5% to where they were before.

Why it matters: The economic fallout will likely intensify, as short-term measures to deal with the unprecedented energy shock no longer suffice.

• Whether that matters to markets is unclear.

The big picture: It's whiplash from where we left it on Friday. Stocks soared after Iran's foreign minister declared the Strait of Hormuz "completely open," and President Trump expressed confidence that peace was coming.

• But even then, such a proclamation seemed too good to be true: "The market priced peace. The oil system didn't," is how PSI Capital put it in a Substack Friday.
• Of the five "normalization" markers for the oil market that they are tracking — shipping through the strait, insurance prices, etc. — none was flashing a green light.

Catch up quick: Iran attacked several commercial vessels on Saturday after announcing it was once again closing the Strait of Hormuz, Axios' Barak Ravid reported over the weekend.

• The U.S. blockade is still in place. Transit through the strait is at a standstill.
• Yesterday, U.S. Central Command said it seized an Iranian ship, the Touska, which was trying to sail toward an Iranian port. It was the first time the U.S. navy took such action, notes Axios' Rebecca Falconer.

Zoom in: The energy shock is still making its way around the world. "Structurally, nothing has improved," JPMorgan commodities analysts wrote in a note Friday.

• Shortfalls will soon start to appear, warns HFE economics in a post this morning. This is about more than oil.
• The war has shut in supplies of urea (critical for fertilizer) and helium (for silicon chips). 

The intrigue: Even as shortages are worsening, the price of physical oil is still below its high of $144 per barrel on April 7.

• That's partly because the oil reserves that governments around the world have tapped have helped keep a lid on prices.
• It's also because European refineries are now finding it so costly to buy and refine oil, that they are buying less of it.
• "Demand destruction is beginning to take hold in the region," the JP Morgan analysts write.

Yes, but: Despite the dire warnings, many analysts think that the back and forth now is mostly posturing and that a deal is likely.

• "Not because we believe that U.S. and Iran have found a solution, but because of the MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) principle," notes Jefferies this morning. "We are at a stage where it is not in the interest of either [party] to carry on with the war."

What to watch: Vice President Vance is headed back to Islamabad for another round of talks scheduled for tomorrow.

• It's not yet clear that Iran will participate — and if it does, there are signs of fractures in leadership there, as the Critical Threats tracker, operated by the American Enterprise Institute, notes.

The bottom line: The markets keep moving up on headlines that front run reality.

Some red state lawmakers are floating legislation that would make it easier to use gold and silver as currency and to establish gold stockpiles.

Why it matters: Lawmakers say that the commodities are a good option for dealing with the burden of rising inflation because the value of gold and silver has increased, while the dollar has not.

• "Recognizing gold and silver as legal tender promotes economic justice," reads a draft bill in Georgia, "by allowing citizens of every economic status access to the ability to preserve their wealth by hedging against inflation with precious metals."

State of play: The Georgia legislation would authorize "mechanisms" that would let you pay for things in gold and silver, possibly using prepaid debit cards like those offered by Glint, a small U.K.-based company that supports the laws. (It failed to pass, but backers plan to try again.)

• Similar "transactional gold laws" have been proposed in Arizona, Oklahoma and Iowa — to varying degrees of success.
• Utah passed a law earlier this year.

Zoom in: Lawmakers emphasize that they just want to give people more options. And no one is being forced to use gold or any gold-backed product instead of dollars.

• Most don't harbor any illusions that the U.S. is going back to the gold standard.
• "It's essentially just giving people another way of being paid," Utah state treasurer Marlo Oaks tells Axios.
• Utah also passed a bill in 2024 that allows the state to invest up to 10% of its "rainy day fund" in gold.

The big picture: The price of gold has been on a tear in recent years for a few reasons.

• First, the creation of gold ETFs, or exchange-traded funds, has made it much easier to buy and hold the asset.
• Gold has also gotten a boost from everyday investors.
• And central banks have increased their purchases of gold (though that trend appears to be slowing now).

By the numbers: Gold is currently trading around $4,800 a troy ounce — that's less than where it was earlier in the year, but is still $1,000 more than it was this time in 2025.

Zoom out: That kind of price volatility is appealing to investors, but one of many reasons that gold doesn't make sense as a currency, as nearly any economist or monetary and finance expert would tell you.

Between the lines: People have been obsessed with gold for centuries, says Jacob Goldstein, author of "Money: The True Story of a Made-Up Thing," a history of currency.

• "Gold is not money," he says. "It hasn't been money for many decades. It didn't work very well as money when it was money."
• But gold can feel like something outside of the government's control, he adds.
• "It takes the power of money away from the government to, you know, in some fundamental way, I think that is part of the appeal."

The harder they fall, the higher they rise: The so-called Magnificent 7 stocks led the S&P 500 down in March, and their rally has supported the index's bounce back up in April.