🛢️ Oil just dropped 5%. One deal could do it.
Three big stories today, and they're all pulling in different directions. Cheap oil, soft jobs, a pharma giant printing money. Let's get into it.
🛢️ Oil just dropped 5%. One deal could do it.
Three big stories today, and they're all pulling in different directions. Cheap oil, soft jobs, a pharma giant printing money. Let's get into it.
Alex Monroe
August 06, 2026
⏱️ ~4 min read
📊 Today's Numbers
Brent Crude ▼ $79/bbl: lowest close since 10 July
WTI Crude ▼ $74.50/bbl: 10%+ drop across two sessions
10-Year Treasury ▼ 4.609%: ADP miss dragged yields down
ADP Private Payrolls ▼ 44,000: smallest monthly gain of 2026
Eli Lilly ▲ ~+5% pre-market: GLP-1 drugs dominate Q2
30-Year Fixed Mortgage ■ 6.66%: elevated, and Cook wants it there
🛢️ COMMODITIES
Iran-Oman Hormuz Deal Nears. Oil Tumbles 5%.
An outline framework to reopen the Strait of Hormuz has reportedly been agreed, with Iran managing inbound vessel traffic and Oman overseeing outbound lanes under a proposed fee arrangement. President Trump extended a signing deadline to today. Oil markets didn't wait for the ink.
Brent fell 5.3% to $79/bbl — its lowest close since 10 July, with WTI sliding to $74.50 across two sessions, a move of more than 10%
The Strait carries about 20% of the world's traded oil, so even a partial reopening reshapes global supply chains that have been snarled for months
If sustained, pump prices could follow within two to four weeks — that's real money back in household budgets
💬 Oil was above $90 a barrel. Now it's $79 and falling. The deal still needs a signature.
🏦 MACROECONOMIC
Photo: Ann H
US Private Hiring Just Posted Its Worst Month of 2026
ADP reported 44,000 private-sector jobs added in July. The consensus was 75,000. June's figure was already revised down to 95,000. This is a meaningful miss, and it arrives 48 hours before the official BLS payrolls report on Friday.
44,000 vs. 75,000 consensus — the weakest ADP print of 2026, with the 10-year Treasury yield dropping to 4.609% within minutes of the release
Friday's nonfarm payrolls consensus sits at +83,000, unemployment steady at 4.2%. If the official data echoes ADP, the Fed's calculus gets complicated fast
The 30-year fixed mortgage averaged 6.66% as of 30 July — weak labour data won't bring that down overnight, but it may take a hike off the table for now
💬 Fewer jobs than expected, and somehow that's the most hopeful housing news of the week.
📈 EQUITIES
Photo: Monstera Production
Eli Lilly's Quarter Was Almost Absurdly Good
Revenue of $22.97 billion against a $20.69 billion consensus. A $2.37 earnings-per-share beat. Mounjaro sales up 91% year-on-year. Zepbound U.S. revenue up 44%. Lilly also raised full-year guidance above consensus, and shares jumped nearly 5% before markets opened.
$22.97bn in Q2 revenue, up 47.7% year-on-year — the largest quarterly beat in Lilly's recent history, driven entirely by GLP-1 drugs that barely existed three years ago
Mounjaro +91% and Zepbound +44% — two products now reshaping how the world treats obesity and diabetes at scale, putting direct competitive pressure on Novo Nordisk, which reports this week
Lilly raised full-year guidance above consensus, which has implications for insurance coverage negotiations and, eventually, how quickly patients can actually access these drugs
💬 Lilly just beat analyst expectations by over $2 billion. The harder question is whether patients can get the drugs at all.
📰 Also Today
Fed Governor Cook signals rate hike readiness: Cook said on 5 August that inflation risks are "higher than employment risks" — the most direct hike signal from a sitting Fed Governor in months, and a direct argument against any near-term relief on the 6.66% 30-year mortgage rate.
New Zealand unemployment hits 5.6%, a decade high: Q2 2026 data beat forecasts to the downside, with participation jumping to 70.7% faster than jobs were created — annual wage growth sits at just 2.0%, and the RBNZ is now under renewed pressure to cut rates further.
SpaceX fell 13.6% despite $7.81bn in Q2 revenue: A 92% year-on-year top-line beat wasn't enough — $18.4 billion in capital expenditure (a sixfold increase) spooked investors, and roughly $101 billion in shares became newly eligible for trading on the same day; Nvidia rose as much as 4% after Musk pledged to use its chips exclusively for AI services.
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Not investment advice. For informational purposes only.