Into a five-session week: HPE tonight, NFP Friday, MOU still pending.

Sunday-night futures are higher after May’s strongest equity month of 2026. The cards below carry the four readings that set the tone into the cash open — the detailed account follows in the section below.

The Iran-US framework did not sign over the weekend. Trump ended Friday’s Situation Room meeting without his final determination, made Friday demands on the Hormuz language, Iran’s nuclear program and frozen-asset terms that Iran’s Fars news outlet pushed back against (“raised issues that contradict the provisions of the agreement’s text”), and his Sunday social-media post explicitly told his negotiators not to rush. Hardliners on both sides — Netanyahu coalition partners pressing on the verification terms, IRGC commanders pressing on the perceived softening of nuclear-program restrictions — have applied pressure that delayed the formal signing for a third consecutive weekend even though the wording itself sits at 95% completion. The 60-day deal terms remain: unrestricted Hormuz vessel traffic with no tolls, Iran clears all mines within 30 days, US naval blockade relief on Iranian ports, continued uranium-stockpile negotiations inside the 60-day window. Defense Secretary warned over the weekend that the US military remains ready to resume combat in the Gulf if needed.

Sunday-night futures responded to the AI-capex backdrop more than the MOU slippage: S&P futures +0.27% to 7,616.50, Nasdaq futures +0.51%, Dow futures +0.13% to 51,144. HPE traded +13.7% in pre-market reading across from Friday’s late-week strength on Dell ($43B AI-server backlog) and Snowflake ($6B AWS deal) — the AI-infrastructure complex is the structural anchor. The Vault Hormuz indicator stays RESTRICTED at ~10.5 mb/d as commercial operators continue to price higher signature probability through the week. The asymmetric weekend question is whether the MOU lands inside this week or slips again — every business day without signature is a small leak in the de-escalation narrative.

Each card below opens with a Spotlight row driving last week’s narrative for that asset class. Toggle the Week ⇄ YTD control above any spotlight to flip the entire card. Note: these are Friday close numbers — Sunday-night futures and Asia-open moves are captured in the snapshot above, not in the cards below.

The MOU slipping a third weekend dials Base higher than Bull this week. Base 45% is the central case — signature slips into late-week as Trump asks his negotiators not to rush, AI earnings come in mixed, ranges hold. Bull 35% requires the MOU to sign Mon-Wed plus an HPE / CrowdStrike / Broadcom clean sweep plus a soft May NFP. Bear 20% is a Trump walk from the framework, Iran retaliation, or an AI-earnings disappointment that breaks the AI-capex narrative. Each card carries the thesis, the Vault positioning note, and asset-level targets for Friday’s close.

A full five-session week — first of June. The dense calendar runs HPE Monday after the close (options pricing a 12.9% post-print swing), CrowdStrike Tuesday after-hours, ADP Wednesday morning, Broadcom Thursday after-hours (the AI-semis read), and the May NFP print Friday at 08:30 ET. The September cut probability sits at 79% — a soft NFP takes it above 85%, a hot print pulls it back toward 65%. The Powell-era policy framing under Warsh’s continuation remains explicit on patience until the supercore breaks decisively below 3% — Thursday’s print delivered 3.05%. The MOU signature watch continues all week.

ADX returns to trading today after the Eid extension; DFM, the Qatar Stock Exchange and Tadawul resume their normal Mon-Fri schedule with last week’s risk-on momentum still intact. Regional credit closed the week at post-conflict tights: Qatar 5-year CDS extended to fresh lows; UAE 10-year eurobond spreads tightened a further 3 bps; Saudi 5-year CDS sits inside the levels that held in mid-March before escalation. The credit market has priced the framework’s eventual signature; today’s ADX open is the cleanest single-line read on whether the regional equity market believes the signature lands this week. With Trump’s Friday demands drawing pushback from Iran’s Fars news outlet and the deal slipping a third weekend, Aramco and ADNOC may give back further on the framework-fragility read; alternatively, if Trump’s tone shifts back to deal-completion language, the regional banks (Emirates NBD, FAB, Al Rajhi, QNB) extend their bid.

For the week, the regional positioning question is the dual binary: MOU signature plus HPE-style AI-infrastructure read-through. The Vault house view through the week: maintain the GCC overweight; favour banks and developers over oil-linked equity if Brent holds the $88–$95 corridor; trim oil-linked equity if Brent breaks decisively below $88; treat the Hormuz indicator as the cleanest single forward-looking line on whether the deal holds. The asymmetric tail remains a Trump walk from the framework, an Iran walk-back, or a meaningful Israeli intervention. The eventual signed-MOU outcome and the cycle-low supercore (3.05% YoY) together represent the cleanest soft-landing setup we have seen since the conflict began — and regional risk-premium compression still has room.

Three threads will define how the five-session week plays out: whether the Iran MOU finally signs after slipping a third weekend, whether the HPE / CrowdStrike / Broadcom earnings run confirms the AI-infrastructure read, and how Friday’s May NFP print lands as the September-cut anchor.