Just watched the markets open on Monday and honestly, everyone's running for cover. The Iran-US talks fell apart over the weekend and now things are getting tense. Trump said it was "very friendly" but the reality is Iran won't budge on their nuclear program, so we're stuck. Then came the news about a potential blockade in the Strait of Hormuz starting Monday morning. That's when you know traders are getting nervous.

Oil jumped hard at the open. WTI was pushing near $96 a barrel, up about 6% just like that. Classic risk-off move. Stock futures dropped 0.6 to 0.7%, the dollar strengthened past 99.00 on the index. When geopolitical tensions spike, this is the playbook.

Gold took an interesting path. Started the week with a sharp dip, hit a six-day low below $4,650, but then recovered during European hours and climbed back above $4,700. That's the safe-haven bid kicking in.

On the currency side, things got messy. The euro opened weak but found its footing around 1.1700, still down 0.3% for the day. Sterling had it worse after a strong week prior - opened with a bearish gap just above 1.3400, down 0.35%. But here's what caught my attention: the yen kept strengthening against the dollar, trading above 159.50 after two consecutive days of gains. When you think about the yen-to-dollar conversion at those levels, it shows how much capital is flowing toward safe havens. The Bank of Japan governor mentioned economic recovery is still modest post-conflict, and inflation's gradually moving toward their target.

Meanwhile, the inflation data from Friday showed CPI hit 3.3% annually in March, up from 2.4% in February. Monthly it was 0.9% as expected. So the backdrop here is geopolitical risk plus persistent inflation concerns. That's keeping markets on edge.