Lately, I’ve been closely monitoring this situation between the US and Iran because it has direct implications for the markets. Pakistani mediators expect Teheran to submit a revised peace proposal by Friday at the latest, according to reports from April 29. It’s a fairly tight timeline given how fragile the situation is.

The real bottleneck remains access to Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader. Sources close to the negotiations say the main difficulty is getting direct clearance from Khamenei for any official response. In practice, Iran’s power structure is so fragmented that even negotiators struggle to get Teheran to speak with a single, unified voice. IRGC factions continue to complicate matters, making it even harder for Iran’s civilian government to find a unified position.

What makes all of this even more interesting is that Pakistan has decided to raise the stakes publicly. Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the Iranian Foreign Minister personally assured him of a response during negotiations this weekend in Islamabad. Making this promise public is a notable tactical move—essentially, Pakistan is applying direct diplomatic pressure on Khamenei and on the entire Iranian leadership.

From Washington, even clearer signals are coming: the White House has indicated that patience is running out. That Friday window isn’t a flexible target—it’s a real deadline. Trump had already rejected a previous version of the Iranian proposal, so Teheran now has to deal with a situation where maneuvering room is practically zero.

For those watching the markets, this is a binary catalyst in the short term. If the revised proposal gains White House approval, the geopolitical risk premium embedded in oil could fall significantly. Brent is still above $114 per barrel—a level that keeps global macroeconomic conditions under pressure. De-escalation could provide a serious tailwind for Bitcoin and risk-on assets in general.

Conversely, if Teheran fails to present a proposal within the timeframe or receives a second rejection, energy prices will remain inflated, and the environment will stay hostile to speculative positions. The next 48–72 hours are likely among the most significant in this conflict from a diplomatic standpoint. Traders in these markets should keep their eyes open on how the situation with Iran develops and on Khamenei’s moves—it could be the factor that defines May’s sentiment.