The S&P 500 closed flat Friday. Reporters blamed Iran and semiconductors because markets need a narrative the way drunk people need an excuse.
Iran fears. That's the phrase. Not Iranian policy shifts or actual geopolitical developments worth pricing in. Just fears. Vague, unquantifiable fears that showed up right when someone needed to explain why the line moved left instead of right.
The chip sell-off gets second billing. Tech stocks fell because too many people owned them and someone blinked first. But chip sell-off sounds better than profit-taking or everyone panicked at the same time for no reason.
The Nasdaq led weekly losses among the three major averages. Leading losses is like being valedictorian of summer school. Congratulations on your technical achievement in coordinated failure.
Here's what actually happened: prices moved within normal ranges, volume was unremarkable, and the close landed near the open. That's not a story. So financial media reaches into the grab bag of international concerns and sector rotations until something sticks.
Retail traders spent Friday cross-referencing headlines with their portfolios, trying to figure out if they own Iranian chip manufacturers. They don't. They own three shares of an ETF that owns a fund that owns another fund that might have semiconductor exposure. But they'll check anyway.
The market closed little changed. That's the headline. Everything after the word Friday is set dressing. Iran could be replaced with Bolivia. Chips could be replaced with dental equipment. The S&P would still be flat and reporters would still file 800 words explaining why.
Monday the market will open and move some other direction, and someone will explain that too, using completely different reasons that sound equally authoritative. The line goes up, the line goes down, and nobody knows why until after it happens.
Photo by Olha Ivanova on Unsplash
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