Wall Street treads cautiously ahead of Trump’s 8 p.m. deadline for Tehran, while weak services data and private credit jitters add to investor unease.

U.S. stock futures drifted lower on Tuesday as investors kept a close eye on the approaching deadline set by President Donald Trump for Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz — a flashpoint that has kept global markets on edge for weeks.

Futures Point to a Cautious Open

By 06:33 ET, Dow futures were broadly flat, S&P 500 futures had slipped 6 points, or 0.1%, and Nasdaq 100 futures edged down 43 points, or 0.2%. The moves came after all three major Wall Street indices closed higher in the prior session, as traders found some comfort in early diplomatic signals from the Middle East.

Weak Services Data Adds to Growth Concerns

Beyond the geopolitical noise, a fresh set of economic data offered little reassurance. U.S. services sector activity expanded at a slower-than-expected pace in March — a period overlapping with much of the ongoing conflict — while employment in the sector contracted outright. Prices paid, a closely watched inflation gauge, jumped to their highest level since October 2022, underscoring concerns that elevated energy costs are beginning to filter through to the broader economy.

Private Credit Markets Under Strain

Anxiety also lingered around the $1.8 trillion private credit market. Shares of Blue Owl Capital, which has emerged as a bellwether for stress in the sector, tumbled to an all-time closing low after the firm announced it would restrict redemptions from two of its funds in response to a surge in withdrawal requests — a development that rattled confidence in an already fragile corner of financial markets.

Oil Holds Firm Near $110

Crude prices remained stubbornly elevated, with shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz still barely moving. Brent crude futures rose 0.4% to $110.11 per barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate climbed 1.3% to $113.82 — both well above the roughly $70 per barrel seen before hostilities began. The strait, through which approximately one-fifth of global oil supply flows, has been effectively closed to tanker traffic for weeks, squeezing supplies to energy-hungry economies across Asia and Europe alike.

Trump reiterated at a Monday press conference that any ceasefire agreement must explicitly include Iran’s commitment to reopen the waterway, vowing to strike bridges and power plants across the country should Tehran miss his 8 p.m. ET Tuesday deadline. The president nonetheless left room for diplomacy, suggesting Iran “would like to make a deal.”

Broadcom Jumps on Major Google AI Partnership

Not all the headlines were defined by conflict. Shares of Broadcom rose in premarket trading after the chipmaker announced a long-term agreement with Google to develop and support custom next-generation artificial intelligence processors. The deal also includes the supply of networking components for Google’s AI infrastructure racks through 2031. In a separate but related development, Broadcom will provide AI startup Anthropic with access to approximately 3.5 gigawatts of AI computing capacity drawing on Google’s processors, starting next year.

Analysts at Vital Knowledge told clients the agreements signal meaningful upside to Broadcom’s prior guidance of more than $100 billion in AI revenue by 2027 — a figure that now looks increasingly conservative given the scale of the commitments unveiled.

With Trump’s deadline hours away and diplomatic channels still open, Wall Street’s next move may hinge as much on events in Tehran as on anything happening on the trading floor.