Can oil hit $200? What about $250? Our guest in this episode says its a possibility of the Strait of Hormuz remains closed. The oil market has been rocked by escalating tensions in the Middle East, massive price swings, and a growing debate over whether the world is heading into a full-blown energy shock. In this special two-part episode of In the Money with Amber Kanwar, we bring you perspectives from both sides of the market with Josh Young, Portfolio Manager at Bison Investments, and Patrick O’Rourke, Managing Director, Institutional Equity Research at ATB Cormark Capital Markets.
This will be the last daily newsletter for a week! I will be back online March 23rd. We will still have two new episodes next week, but less tied to the news flow! Maybe that is a good thing.
Here are five things to know this week:
Correction: US markets are in the green this morning as crude oil slips. It’s hard to see a situation where that remains given the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Oil prices could breach their 2008 highs, warns noted commodity strategist Helima Croft of RBC in a note to clients this morning. “We believe that we will exceed the Russia/Ukraine oil price highs of $128/bbl in 2022 if the war continues for another three to four weeks with minimal progress on maritime security,” she wrote, “And that we will surpass the 2008 peak of $146/bbl if it extends for several more months.” Her conversations with sources in DC suggest we could see the war drag out with boots on the ground. Is this priced in? The S&P 500 is down 4% from its record high. Somehow the TSX has fared worse, down 5% from its record high largely because gold has sold off since the war taking down precious metal stocks while energy stocks have barely rallied. This morning we got a read of US inflation that was inline with expectations while consumer spending was tepid. Both reports pre-date the Iran war and are not likely to be informative for future policy rates.
Breaking: Canada unexpectedly lost 84,000 jobs in February and the unemployment rate increased two ticks to 6.7%. All of the job losses were full-time (-108,000), most in the private sector (-72,600) but public sector also fell (-17,000). By industry we saw weakness in manufacturing and construction jobs – two areas of weakness in the Canadian economy right now related to trade and the housing market. Jobs in service producing and goods producing sectors also dropped. “The Canadian labour market took a worrisome turn in February,” wrote CIBC’s Katherine Judge, “Overall, this is clearly a very worrisome report for the (Bank of Canada) that shows that labour market slack has increased and activity is frozen amidst trade uncertainty.” However, if inflation picks up due to higher energy prices the Bank of Canada could be limited in its ability to react.
Airbrush: Shares of Adobe are plunging 8% after a drop in annual recurring revenue and the surprise announcement the long-time CEO will be leaving. While revenue and profit exceeded expectations, annual recurring revenue declined 11% from last year. This raises questions around near term demand, says Tyler Radke of Citi. “The announced CEO change adds another layer of uncertainty at a delicate moment in the story, as Adobe navigates a rapidly evolving AI and competitive landscape.” Adobe has struggled as investors worry that free image tools through LLMs like Grok or ChatGPT are going to reduce demand for paid offerings by Adobe. Having said that, revenue growth in the quarter was the strongest since Q3 2022. Barclays isn’t recommending you chase this one lower, downgrading Adobe following the results and the CEO departure.
Fertile ground: Nutrien is catching another upgrade this morning, this time at Wells Fargo. Recall, yesterday Jefferies upgraded the stock. Similar to that upgrade, Wells is upgrading based on the conflict in Iran which has pushed up fertilizer prices. Chemical stocks have been on a tear with shares of Mosaic, CF Industries, Nutrien and Methanex getting swept up in the trade.
Silver lining: Watch shares of Wheaton Precious Metals after the streamer bested profit expectations on higher realized silver prices. The company came out of 2025 with record revenue and is boosting its dividend 18%. “We expect a positive market reaction to the revenue and EPS beat,” wrote Derick Ma at TD.
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