Asian markets experienced varied outcomes on Monday. The South Korean Kospi index notably fell by nearly 5% as investors moved away from stocks linked to artificial intelligence. Markets in Japan were closed for a holiday, while U.S. futures showed mixed results.
Oil prices increased significantly, with Brent crude rising over 2% to exceed $90 per barrel. This change comes amid escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iran. The U.S. announced new strikes on Monday, marking the ninth consecutive night of attacks. Iran has countered these actions by targeting U.S. allies in the Middle East. Brent crude rose 2.6% to $90.40 per barrel, and U.S. crude increased 2.2% to $83.58 per barrel.
“The U.S. and Iran continue to exchange strikes, which are proving to be deadly for both sides,” ING commodities strategists Warren Patterson and Ewa Manthey noted in a commentary Monday. “If this escalation goes unchecked, we could return to an environment of wide-scale attacks across the Persian Gulf.”
The Strait of Hormuz, a key route for global oil transport, is experiencing a slowdown in tanker traffic, exacerbating supply pressures, noted the strategists.
In Asian trading, the Kospi, deeply influenced by the global focus on AI, dropped 4.9% to 6,490.97. Significant losses occurred with Samsung Electronics down 4.4% and chip maker SK Hynix dropping 3.3%.
Taiwan’s Taiex dipped slightly by less than 0.1%, despite its main chipmaker, TSMC, rising 2%. TSMC had a major decline of 7.3% on Friday following its announcement of a $100 billion investment to increase U.S. chipmaking capacity.
Other Asian indices showed positive trends. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng climbed 2.1% to 25,105.78, and the Shanghai Composite saw a 1.2% increase to 3,808.39. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 went up by 0.2% to 8,815.30, but India’s Sensex dropped by 0.9%.
Global markets were influenced by declines in AI-related stocks, amid speculation that the sector is overheated. The release of another advanced AI model from Moonshot AI in Beijing added to this sentiment, recalling China’s earlier “DeepSeek moment” in 2025. These developments are increasing competition with models like Anthropic’s Claude and OpenAI’s GPT.
Wall Street experienced declines, with the S&P 500 dropping 1% to 7,457.69. The Dow Jones decreased 0.8% to 52,146.42, and the Nasdaq fell 1.4% to 25,520.24. The tech sector saw losses, with Nvidia dropping 2.2% and Broadcom and AMD losing 1% each.
SpaceX shares decreased by 5.4%, going below the initial public offering price of $135 to reach its lowest since its initial Nasdaq listing.
In currency trading, the U.S. dollar decreased slightly to 162.37 yen, while the euro saw a minor increase, rising to $1.1446.