Week Review: Warsh Sworn In as 17th Fed Chair, Dow Record + S&P Eighth Straight Weekly Gain, NVDA Blowout, Brent Down 6% on Week, UMich Final Cratered to 44.8, Iran Rome 5th Round Wraps 'Not Conclusive', Munir in Tehran.

Saturday wrap, 9:00 AM ET, with the cash tape closed for the Memorial Day weekend and the Rome fifth round of US-Iran indirect nuclear talks wrapping in the European morning at “some but not conclusive progress” per Omani Foreign Minister Badr al-Busaidi. The week that ended Friday was structurally the cleanest five-session stretch of Q2 with three offsetting binaries layered into a constructive risk-on tape: the S&P 500 notched an eighth straight weekly gain of roughly 0.9 percent to close at 7,473.47, the longest weekly win streak since 2023, the Dow set a fresh record close at 50,579.70 (up 294 points or 0.6 percent on Friday), the Nasdaq Composite finished at 26,343.97 (up 0.19 percent Friday), and the energy curve unwound to a 6 percent weekly decline on Brent and a 7.2 percent weekly decline on WTI as the Iran de-escalation glide path firmed despite the Friday morning Hormuz toll twist and the Rome stall. The week was bracketed by the NVDA Q1 FY27 blowout (Wednesday after the close, revenue near $81.6 billion at roughly plus 85 percent year on year), the Deere Q2 FY26 crush at $6.55 versus $5.81 (Thursday BMO), the Ross Stores Q1 FY26 print at $2.02 versus $1.70 with the FY guide raised to a $7.50 to $7.74 range (Thursday AMC), the Ralph Lauren Q4 FY26 print at $2.80 versus $2.54 with full year revenue crossing $8 billion for the first time, the Williams-Sonoma Q1 print at $1.93 with a plus 4.8 percent comp, and the historic Warsh swearing-in at the White House at 11 AM ET Friday as the 17th Federal Reserve Chair, the first such ceremony at the executive residence in roughly 40 years. The duration tape stayed sticky against this backdrop with the 10Y closing the week at 4.56 percent (modestly higher on net despite Friday’s three basis point bid on deal hopes) and the 2Y at 4.01 percent, the highest since February 2025 as the front end repriced toward Fed Governor Waller’s mid-week framing that the next move is just as likely to be a hike as a cut. The UMich Final for May printed at 10 AM ET Friday at a record low 44.8 versus the 48.2 preliminary and consensus, a third straight monthly decline, with year-ahead inflation expectations ticking up to 4.8 percent (from 4.7 preliminary) and the long-run reading climbing from 3.5 percent in April to 3.9 percent in May, materially above the 2.8 to 3.2 percent corridor that held through 2024. The Pakistan-mediated track stepped up Friday with Army Chief Field Marshal Asim Munir landing in Tehran for a third round of direct talks with the Interior Minister and the Foreign Minister, Qatar formally joining the mediation effort alongside Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey, and Secretary Rubio noting “slight progress” on the negotiation track, against the binding-constraint backdrop that Trump publicly rejected the leaked Iran-Oman Hormuz toll framework with the line that the US wants the waterway “open, free, without tolls” and the parallel CBS reporting that any vessels paying tolls would be intercepted by US Navy assets in the strait. The Rome fifth round of indirect talks via Oman wrapped Saturday morning after roughly three hours with the public read that progress was real but the uranium enrichment cap versus dismantle gap remains the binding nuclear-side constraint that no mediator has bridged. Asia delivered a clean second consecutive blowout session Friday with the Nikkei closing plus 2.68 percent at 63,339 and the Hang Seng plus 0.86 percent at 25,606, while Europe lifted broadly with the DAX plus 1.15 percent to 24,889, the FTSE 100 plus 0.22 percent to 10,466, the CAC 40 plus 0.37 percent to 8,116, and the EURO STOXX 50 plus 0.99 percent to 6,019. The week ahead carries a Memorial Day Monday close, the May 26 Case-Shiller plus Conference Board Consumer Confidence print, the May 28 Durable Goods and Initial Jobless Claims, and the cleanest single macro catalyst of the month with the April Core PCE on the May 29 print, against a heavy earnings calendar fronted by Salesforce, Dell, Marvell, Snowflake, CrowdStrike, Zscaler, MongoDB, NetApp, Gap, Abercrombie, Dollar Tree, Kohl’s, HP, AutoZone and Dick’s Sporting Goods.

Three things to internalize over the long weekend:

1. The eighth straight weekly gain on the S&P 500 plus the Dow record close are not a sentiment-led melt-up but a corporate-cycle confirmation tape, and the right structural read is that the cyclical-cohort bottom is now in. The week’s dispersion underneath the headline index gain is the binding signal: NVDA’s roughly plus 85 percent revenue print confirmed the AI capex flywheel is intact, DE’s 12.7 percent EPS beat plus the 29 percent jump in Construction and Forestry plus the 16 percent jump in Small Ag confirmed the OEM ag cycle has bottomed, ROST’s 18.8 percent EPS beat plus the FY guide raise confirmed the trade-down dynamic from WMT’s soft Q2 guide is fully flowing into the off-price flywheel, RL’s clean 17 percent revenue print confirmed the high-end discretionary cohort has not broken on the UMich consumer-confidence trough, and WSM’s plus 4.8 percent comp with West Elm leading at plus 8.5 percent confirmed the home furnishings cohort has stabilized. The right discipline into the holiday-shortened week is to hold the cyclical exposure (DE June 540/570 call spread, ROST June 175/185 call spread, the NVDA and SMH core position) and add a modest XLY June call spread sized at 0.05 percent NAV as the structural read on the Q3 multiple re-rate setup.

2. The Iran mosaic is now structurally bifurcated between a constructive diplomatic glide path (Pakistan-Qatar-Saudi-Egypt-Turkey mediation, Rome talks continuing, 30-day window letter of intent close to text, Brent down 6 percent on the week) and a binding nuclear-side gap (uranium enrichment cap versus full dismantle, Khamenei uranium-stays-in-country directive, Iran-Oman Hormuz toll framework leaked and Trump-rejected) that keeps the energy curve volatile inside a $98 to $108 Brent range. The Memorial Day weekend gas pump price binary running into Monday’s closed-market session is the tactical hedge driver, and the Rome 5th round wrapping at “some but not conclusive” is the structural read that the back-channel is functioning but the deal text is not yet in hand. Our memo probability mark moves up to 48 percent (from the Friday 46 percent) on the Rome continuation language and the Qatar formal entry, partially offset by the unresolved uranium gap. The right play is to hold the Brent August 105/115 call spread protected by the short 95 put added Friday (sized 0.10 percent NAV gross), hold the XLE June 99/108 call spread (0.20 percent NAV), and let the dispersion across the long weekend headlines work the structure rather than press the directional view.

3. The Warsh swearing-in plus the UMich Final cratering to a record-low 44.8 plus the 5Y inflation expectations climbing to 3.9 percent are the cleanest single setup for a hawkish first Warsh FOMC on June 16 to 17, and the front end is now repricing accordingly with the 2Y at 4.01 percent (highest since February 2025) and Waller’s “hike just as likely” comment confirming the institutional bias. Warsh’s swearing-in remarks framed a “reform-oriented Federal Reserve” with the dual mandate language (“price stability and maximum employment”) preserved, but the historic White House venue plus Trump’s “be totally independent, do your own thing” framing is the structural read that the new chair starts with a clean hawkish runway and limited dovish optionality. The FY26 Core PCE Friday print is the binding macro catalyst, with consensus near 2.8 percent year on year and the Cleveland nowcast tracking 2.9 to 3.0 percent on the energy passthrough. We hold the SOFRZ6 96.25/96.00 put spread at the current mark (Friday close near 5.30, Wednesday entry at 4.5) and hold the 30Y short via TYZ at 5.08 yield, with the structural compounding into June 16 to 17 intact.

Weekly Performance Scorecard

Day-by-Day Narrative | Mon May 18 to Fri May 22

Iran Mosaic | Rome 5th Round Wraps, Munir in Tehran, Hormuz Toll Killed

The week’s diplomatic mosaic was structurally constructive on net despite the Friday Hormuz toll twist and the Saturday Rome stall. Five mediator tracks ran in parallel: Pakistan via Field Marshal Asim Munir (third Tehran visit of the cycle), Oman (carrying the Rome 5th round indirect-talks framework), Qatar (formal entry this week as a fifth mediator alongside Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Turkey), and the joint Saudi-Egypt-Turkey backbench. The substantive negotiating posture, per multiple wires, is a draft letter of intent for an immediate ceasefire plus a 30-day window of bilateral negotiations covering nuclear suspension term, sanctions relief sequencing and Hormuz transit rules. Tehran’s position is a 12-year nuclear program suspension with uranium stockpile staying in-country; the US position is a 20-year suspension with full enrichment dismantlement plus shipment of the 60 percent stockpile out of country. The Rome 5th round wrapped Saturday morning at “some but not conclusive progress” with Araghchi calling it “one of the most professional rounds of talks” and Oman’s al-Busaidi confirming both sides agreed to continue.

Iran Box Score (Saturday Mark)

The structural read is that the diplomatic track has institutional depth across five mediators and a working draft document, but the binding uranium gap (enrichment cap versus dismantle) is the cleanest single deal-killer. The Memorial Day weekend gas pump price binary is the tactical hedge driver into the Monday close, and the right discipline is to hold the Brent August protective structure rather than press the directional view.

Earnings Week Recap | The Big Prints

This was the second-strongest earnings week of Q1 2026 for the coverage list, with NVDA the index-level event and the discretionary cohort dispersion the binding read.

Top Beat-and-Raise Prints

Negative Prints

Cohort Read-Across | Live Into Tuesday Reopen

NVDA’s cleanly positive read-across to SMH, MU, AVGO, ARM, MRVL holds; SMH at 52-week highs, MRVL prints Thursday AMC. DE’s positive read-across to AGCO, CNH, CAT (C&F translation) is the structural ag-OEM cycle bottom signal. ROST’s inverse-WMT trade-down read is binding for TGT, BURL, TJX. RL’s luxury resilience read is positive for TPR, CPRI, LVMUY. WMT’s soft Q2 guide is the structural negative read for KSS (prints next week), DLTR (prints next week), and the broader mass-merch cohort.

Macro and Earnings Calendar | Week Ahead May 25-29

The week is short (Memorial Day Monday) but the macro slate is heavy at the back end, with the April Core PCE on Friday the binding event for the front-end curve and the first Warsh FOMC setup.

Warsh Swearing-In | Setup Into the First Warsh FOMC

Kevin Warsh was sworn in at 11 AM ET Friday by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas at the White House in a ceremony that preceded a roughly 23-minute Trump speech laying out an aggressive growth and disinflation agenda. The key political signal was Trump’s verbal release of pressure (“I want Kevin to be totally independent, don’t look at me, don’t look at anybody, just do your own thing”), which is the structural confirmation that the President is publicly framing the institutional independence question on his terms rather than litigating it through dissent or removal threats. Warsh’s remarks framed a “reform-oriented Federal Reserve” with the dual mandate language preserved and the institutional priors (“escaping static frameworks and models, upholding clear standards of integrity”) signaling a hawkish bias on the framework review without committing to specific policy outcomes. The first binding catalyst is the June 16 to 17 FOMC plus dot plot, with the April Core PCE Friday and the May payrolls print on June 6 the two cleanest macro inputs into the dot-plot positioning. The 2Y at 4.01 percent (highest since February 2025) on Waller’s mid-week “hike just as likely as a cut” framing is the front-end signal that the curve is now repricing the rate-cut path closer to zero through year end.

Trade Ideas | Three Structures Sized for the Holiday Week and the First Warsh FOMC

Brent August 105/115 Call Spread + Short 95 Put (Hold from Friday)

Hold the Brent August 105/115 call spread protected by the short 95 put at the Friday entry mark (net 3.25 debit per spread, 0.10 percent NAV gross sized), and hold the XLE June 19 99/108 call spread (0.20 percent NAV, Thursday re-add at 4.80 net debit). The combined structure expresses the read that the diplomatic glide path keeps Brent inside a $98 to $108 range through the Rome continuation and Memorial Day gas pump binary, with the OPEC+ Vienna ministerial June 7 the binding production-side catalyst beyond the headline window. PT 8.50 on the Brent structure (top of $115 strike), PT 7.50 on the XLE structure. Stop on a clean Memorial Day weekend memo announcement (both Hormuz tolls dropped and uranium-shipment partial agreement) at 50 percent of structure value; risk is a Munir-mediated breakthrough Tuesday or Wednesday with a Hormuz toll drop plus a partial uranium shipment that re-rates the Brent curve $8 lower, and the short 95 put is the protective hedge against the deal-close downside.

SOFRZ6 96.25/96.00 Put Spread + 30Y TYZ Short (Hold + Calendar Add)

Hold the SOFRZ6 96.25/96.00 put spread at the Friday close near 5.30 (Wednesday entry at 4.5 net debit, 0.05 percent NAV); add a small SOFRZ6 96.00/95.75 put spread calendar-stacked at 0.03 percent NAV on Tuesday’s reopen if the front end holds 4.00 percent. Hold the 30Y short via the TYZ pair at 5.08 yield as the structural compounding leg into June 16 to 17. The structure expresses the read that the Warsh inheritance of a hawkish four-vote internal block plus Warsh’s reform-oriented framing plus the UMich Final unanchoring at 5Y inflation 3.9 percent plus Waller’s “hike just as likely” line will compress the December 2026 SOFR rate-cut path from the current roughly 85 basis points priced to a 50 to 65 basis point range. PT 7.00 on the SOFR structure; stop on a 96.50 SOFRZ6 close on a dovish Warsh first-public-statement framing or a sub-2.7 Core PCE print Friday. Risk: a soft April Core PCE plus a Trump-pressured Warsh dovish pivot in the first public speech could compress the curve toward 96.40 SOFRZ6, and the 0.05 to 0.08 percent NAV sizing is calibrated to be losable on that dovish tail.

Cyclical Cohort Call Spread Pair + XLY Add: DE 540/570 + ROST 175/185 + XLY June Call Spread (Hold + New)

Hold the Deere June 19 540/570 call spread at the Friday entry mark (8.20 net debit, 0.05 percent NAV) and the Ross Stores June 19 175/185 call spread at 3.40 net debit (0.05 percent NAV). Add a new small XLY June 19 240/250 call spread at roughly 2.85 net debit on Tuesday’s reopen sized at 0.05 percent NAV gross, expressing the read that the inverse-WMT trade-down cohort plus the RL luxury-resilience print plus the WSM home furnishings stabilization is the structural Q3 multiple re-rate signal for discretionary, with the May Conference Board Consumer Confidence Tuesday morning and the April Core PCE Friday the bracketing macro inputs. Combined PT 16.00 on DE, 7.50 on ROST, 5.50 on XLY. Stop on a single-name DE downward revision, a ROST consumer-confidence linkage in the Tuesday CCI print below 80, or a hot Core PCE above 2.9 percent that triggers a cyclical-cohort de-rate. Risk: a Conference Board CCI print below 80 plus a Core PCE above 2.9 percent would compress all three legs on a stagflation re-read, and the combined 0.15 percent NAV sizing is calibrated to be losable on the stagflation tail.

Signal Tracker | Saturday 9:00 AM ET Mark

The Saturday mosaic is structurally constructive but binary-bifurcated, with the cleanest week-on-week corporate-cycle confirmation of Q2 (NVDA blowout, DE crush, ROST FY raise, RL FY first over $8B, WSM stabilization) running into the unresolved binding constraints of the Iran nuclear-side gap (uranium enrichment cap versus dismantle) and the Hormuz toll framework that Trump publicly rejected, against a backdrop of the historic Warsh White House swearing-in setting up a hawkish first FOMC on June 16 to 17, the front end repricing toward Waller’s “hike just as likely” line with the 2Y at 4.01 percent (highest since February 2025), the UMich Final cratering to a record-low 44.8 with 5Y inflation expectations unanchoring to 3.9 percent, the Brent curve unwinding 6 percent on the week despite the Friday morning Hormuz toll twist that pushed Brent back to $105, and the eighth straight weekly gain on the S&P 500 plus the Dow record close confirming the cyclical-cohort positioning bottom. The book is net plus 5.6 percent long gross going into the long weekend, holding the SMH and NVDA core, the cyclical-cohort cluster (DE plus ROST plus the planned XLY add Tuesday), the energy structure (Brent August protected by short 95 put plus XLE), the duration short cluster (SOFRZ6 put spread plus 30Y short via TYZ), and the trimmed WMT plus held TGT and RL discretionary exposures. The binding catalysts into the holiday-shortened week are the Tuesday Conference Board CCI (Confidence post-UMich shock watch), the Wednesday CRM/SNOW/CRWD/HPQ AMC cluster, the Thursday DELL/MRVL/ZS/MDB/DKS prints, the April Core PCE Friday at 8:30 AM ET, and into June the NVDA Computex Taipei keynote May 31 plus the OPEC+ Vienna ministerial June 7 running into the June 16 to 17 first Warsh FOMC plus dot plot.

What Could Be Wrong

The Saturday mark is a structurally constructive read on the corporate-cycle bottom plus the diplomatic glide path, a structurally bearish-tail read on the Iran two-front nuclear-and-Hormuz gap, and a structurally bearish read on US duration into the Warsh transition. The three biggest sources of error in this setup:

1. A clean Memorial Day weekend memo announcement on Sunday or Monday with both Hormuz tolls dropped and a 30 to 50 percent uranium shipment agreed as the compromise framework. The asymmetry is real because the Pakistan-Qatar-Oman triple-mediator track is functioning, the Rome 5th round wrapped at “some but not conclusive” rather than collapsing, and the 12-year versus 20-year suspension delta is bridgeable through a phased monitoring framework. We model the probability of a Memorial Day weekend memo at 27 percent, the structural-hardening continuation at 23 percent, and the status-quo no-decision through next week at 50 percent. The Brent protective structure plus the short 95 put is the calibrated hedge against the deal-close tail.

2. A soft April Core PCE on Friday at 2.7 percent or below that gives Warsh dovish optionality in the first public statement. The Cleveland nowcast is at 2.9 to 3.0 percent on the energy passthrough, but the year-on-year base effect from April 2025 plus the disinflation in goods plus the lagged effect of the services-side cooling could deliver a clean 2.7 percent print. We model the probability of a sub-2.7 Core PCE at 22 percent and a 2.8 percent in-line print at 48 percent. The SOFRZ6 put spread sizing is calibrated to be losable on the soft-PCE tail; the 30Y short structurally compounds on the hawkish dot-plot read into June 16 to 17.

3. A Conference Board Consumer Confidence print Tuesday below 80 that confirms the UMich 44.8 cratering is broad-based rather than survey-specific. The Conference Board print typically runs higher than the UMich because of its labor-market bias, but the gas-pump passthrough plus the cumulative consumer-confidence trough plus the 5Y inflation expectations unanchoring to 3.9 percent could deliver a sub-80 print that compresses the cyclical-cohort positioning we are adding into. We model the probability of a Conference Board CCI below 80 at 25 percent and an 80 to 85 range at 45 percent. The cyclical-cohort sizing (DE plus ROST plus XLY add) at 0.15 percent NAV combined is calibrated to be losable on the stagflation-tail.

The book is not betting on any single catalyst into the long weekend; it is positioned for the dispersion across the next 96 hours (Memorial Day Monday closed, Rome Saturday wrap, Tuesday Conference Board CCI reopen, Wednesday CRM/SNOW/CRWD AMC cluster, Friday Core PCE) to widen on either deal-close or deal-stall direction, with the Brent August protective structure plus the SOFRZ6 short plus the cyclical-cohort adds positioned to harvest the dispersion rather than press the directional view.

This note reflects information available as of May 23, 2026, 9:00 AM ET, the Saturday morning following the Warsh White House swearing-in Friday, the UMich Final cratering, the DE/ROST/RL/WSM earnings prints, the Iran-Oman Hormuz toll leak plus Trump rejection, the Pakistan Munir third Tehran visit, the Qatar entry to the mediation track, and the Rome 5th round of US-Iran indirect talks wrapping Saturday morning at “some but not conclusive progress.” US markets are closed Monday May 25 for Memorial Day; the bond market is also closed. Markets reopen Tuesday May 26 at 9:30 AM ET cash. The Trump Truth Social cadence through the long weekend, any leak on the resumed US-Iran direct talks track, and any Munir-mediated breakthrough from Tehran may reset positioning by next Tuesday’s reopen. The May 26 Conference Board CCI, the May 27 CRM/SNOW/CRWD prints, the May 28 DELL/MRVL/ZS/MDB cluster, the May 29 Core PCE, the May 31 NVDA Computex Taipei keynote, the June 7 OPEC+ Vienna ministerial, and the June 16-17 first Warsh FOMC plus dot plot are the binding catalysts through mid-June. For internal use only. Not investment advice.