Holding the Strait of Hormuz hostage... The oil math you need to know... Why volatility could dominate in 2026... The strategy behind a 200% return... Greg Diamond's Market Crash Summit...
Oil is the leverage...
We're nearing two weeks of war in Iran now. And as you may have expected, oil and gas flows are becoming a more prominent part of the conflict as each day passes...
What remains of Iran's military continues to attack tankers and Persian Gulf neighbors with drones. The country essentially holds the safety of the Strait of Hormuz and about a quarter of the world's seaborne oil traffic hostage...
Some 500 oil tankers are stuck in the Persian Gulf, according to MarineTraffic.com... And a statement purported to be from new Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei released today tells the Iranian military to keep the pressure on.
"The lever of blocking the Strait of Hormuz must undoubtedly continue to be used," he said, according to an English transcript on a website run by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
Iranian military leaders know this is where they have the most, or only, leverage. Here is their message, as global news service Reuters reported yesterday...
"Get ready for oil to be $200 a barrel, because the oil price depends on regional security, which you have destabilised," Ebrahim Zolfaqari, spokesperson for Iran's military command, said in comments addressed to Washington.
That's not exactly what anyone wants to hear... except energy companies and traders selling oil futures, as buyers continue to hedge against even higher prices.
Prices rose again today, with West Texas Intermediate ("WTI") and Brent crude up around 10% to $96 and $101 per barrel. That's about a 40% jump since the start of the attacks on Iran.
The White House is working on it...
Today, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said in an interview on CNBC that the White House's plan is for the U.S. Navy to begin escorting ships through the strait starting within the next few weeks. Wright said...
It'll happen relatively soon, but it can't happen now. We're simply not ready. All of our military assets right now are focused on destroying Iran's offensive capabilities and the manufacturing industry that supplies their offensive capabilities.
He added, "I'll be over at the Pentagon later today. That is what the military is working on."
Escorting tankers is just one effort to boost oil supplies...
Following the International Energy Agency's announcement of plans to release 400 million barrels of global crude oil reserves, the Trump administration said late yesterday the U.S. will release 172 million barrels of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve ("SPR").
This might sound like a lot, but that's only about a week's worth of the oil that would typically pass through the Strait of Hormuz. It's also about a week's worth of U.S. consumption.
As Stansberry Research analyst Bryan Tycangco wrote in a great post on the social platform X today, this release may also only leave the SPR with one more week's worth (in demand) of the type of oil that typically comes from the Middle East.
Wright also added later that the release would begin next week and take about three months. So the plan essentially calls for meeting a week of demand over three months. This likely won't bring down U.S. or global oil prices very much.
Despite plans to (eventually) release more oil and to (eventually) escort oil tankers past the war zone, the market isn't relaxing.
Volatility reigns and will likely continue to...
Today, with oil prices higher again, the major U.S. stock indexes were down by at least 1.5%. The CBOE Volatility Index ("VIX") rose to around 27. But here's the "good" market news amid all the headlines and moves...
Oil prices are up 40% in about two weeks, and the benchmark S&P 500 Index is down only 5% thus far from its all-time high set near the end of January. The index remains above its longer-term 200-day moving average, but by less than 2%.
You can take all this as a good sign or a warning sign...
If the S&P 500 stays above this technical indicator of "support" – which could happen if any "less bad" news emerges from Iran – that'll be a good sign for the direction of the market in the near term. If not, significantly more downside could be ahead.
For now, though, it might be wise to expect more "chop" – rather than a clear trend higher or lower. For long-term investors, this might not be the most fun environment to watch on a daily basis. For short-term traders, it's a field day...
We've been telling you about Ten Stock Trader editor Greg Diamond's outlook and trading strategy lately... and how he has been taking advantage of the volatility this year, closing eight trades already for an average gain of more than 40%.
As Greg details in the free presentation he debuted earlier this week – the 2026 Market Crash Summit – he expects this volatility and the opportunity for gains like these to continue... And he's also warning of a market "top" in the months ahead.
To close things out today, we have a special Q&A with Greg with more detail about his trading approach and strategy, and also his outlook for the year ahead. I (Corey McLaughlin) caught up with him earlier this week, and here's an edited version of our conversation...
Corey McLaughlin: Let's start here... I've heard that right now you are competing in something called the United States Investing Championship. How'd you get involved in it, and how does it work exactly?
Greg Diamond: The United States Investing Championship ("USIC") is a trading and investing competition held each year for anyone who wishes to enter. It is a year-long competition with different divisions (stocks, futures, options). Past winners include traders and investors like Paul Tudor Jones and Mark Minervini.
I decided to throw my hat in the ring and participate in 2026. I'm in the futures division, so it doesn't conflict with the options trades I recommend for Ten Stock Trader subscribers.
The competition started at the beginning of the year. And through the end of February, I had a 201% return on my portfolio, which is currently first place for my division. There's a long way to go, but off to a good start.
CM: Wow, I'd say that's a good start. So how do you make 200% in two months?
GD: Trading futures is as risky as it gets. You can lose (or make) thousands of dollars in literally seconds. My first trade as a professional trader was in corn futures back in December of 2004, so I've been trading futures for a very long time.
Making 200% in two months doesn't happen all the time... But our publisher, Matt Weinschenk, perfectly explained recently in our annual Report Card how my strategy can make outsized returns.
I don't care whether a market goes up or down. I just need it to move...
When you trade futures, your leverage is enormous, so again you have to handle risk management in very tight windows. You can't just "set it and forget it" like long-term investing.
But when markets are moving – and they have been to start 2026 – I like to trade very low-risk and very high-reward trades. When these opportunities show up and markets move, you can make outsized returns. And I've accomplished that so far to start the year.
CM: You're doing pretty good in Ten Stock Trader too so far this year. You've closed eight trades, all winners, for an average gain around 41%. And this follows an A+ year in 2025, as Matt wrote in the report card you mentioned.
The market has been volatile lately. How have you been able to generate these kinds of results?
GD: As excited as I am for my start in the USIC, I'm even more excited for the success of my subscribers to start 2026.
We've had success in various stocks and ETFs, gold, and silver. And this is because, as I just mentioned, markets are moving.
Our best trade so far was trading the iShares Silver Trust (SLV), which tracks silver prices, for a 150% gain in four days. When silver moves, it really moves, and we captured a nice trade in this market.
Some people think I only trade when markets are in a downtrend or bear market, and that just isn't the case. We've had success when bull markets are volatile, too. We traded the COVID-19 crash in 2020 with bearish trades and turned right around and traded the bullish move in 2020 and into 2021 as well. The same thing happened in the crash of 2022. We were bearish until October, and then we turned bullish to end the year and into 2023.
So again, to generate these types of returns, my strategy works incredibly well when markets are moving.
And in 2026 we've had just that, and we will continue to see volatility throughout the year.
CM: Most of our readers may know by now that you're a technical analyst.
But for those that aren't familiar, how would you describe your trading approach, and why you've found it valuable over the years? I think some people may think of it as "lines on charts," but it's more than that, right?
GD: I always chuckle at those who think technical analysis is simply lines on a chart.
My strategy is much deeper than that. I put a method to the madness. Most people look at a chart and see chaos. I see patterns.
Look at it another way... The collective behavior of investors is the buying and selling of a market. And that is expressed on a chart.
And this behavior repeats in patterns over time.
Price and time are what my strategy is based around. Price patterns and time cycles repeat over and over because human behavior repeats.
CM: Can you share an example of some of your analysis/indicators that you're watching right now?
GD: I'll give you a glimpse of my new proprietary technical indicator I've created, called GTX. It is worth mentioning, I only share this with Ten Stock Trader Premier subscribers and Stansberry Alliance Members once a quarter.
But what I have created – without getting too much in the weeds – is a time and price indicator that gives us the probabilities of where the market is going and, more importantly, when the market will shift.
Here is an example from 2022, which was a big year for us...
The indicator is in blue, overlayed with the price action of the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
You can see how the indicator warned us of a bear market to start the year and a low to trade to end the year in October.
Is it perfect? No. And no indicator is perfect. You can see how it doesn't catch every single bottom or top, but it does a great job of forecasting the turning points and trend changes within a given year.
In 2022, it helped us have our best year so far in Ten Stock Trader with an 83% win rate.
In short, what I'm looking for and what GTX provides are the probabilities of whether to be long or short the stock market and when to do it. It does a great job of that.
There is no Holy Grail in trading. And as I tell my subscribers often, you cannot use one indicator for all markets all the time. You must have a toolbox of tools, and I find the GTX to be a great tool.
CM: At our annual conference in October, I believe you told attendees that you were expecting volatility in 2026. What's your take and view on the market right now?
GD: Yes, I was warning subscribers back then that 2026 would be quite volatile. And we didn't just talk about it – we traded it.
My strategy forewarned of volatility ahead, and that hasn't changed.
The war with Iran likely won't be an in-and-out operation. There are questions about tariffs. Trade deals with China are still on the table. And a new Federal Reserve chair will replace Jerome Powell.
But as you and many subscribers know, I don't focus so much on the "why" or certain catalysts of the market, but more on time and price, and repeating cycles, and price patterns that occur over and over.
CM: What about gold and silver? Those have been two big trades the past few months. Both are up big over the past year or so but had pullbacks more recently. Have they "topped" already or still have room to run?
GD: We've had a nice move in gold and silver. And while the pullback has been sharp (especially in silver), I still think there is room to run. The biggest thing I'm watching is the correlation between precious metals (gold and silver) and the stock market. We may see them trade in tandem in the weeks and months ahead, which will provide a lot of volatility and plenty of opportunity for Ten Stock Trader subscribers.
CM: We've seen big market moves over the past week, with dramatically rising oil prices given the war in Iran. Have the war and rising oil prices changed anything about your outlook?
GD: All this volatility only reinforces what I warned subscribers about back in October 2025. We are seeing this time cycle play out perfectly. Now that doesn't mean I'm going to get every trade right or predict every wiggle up and down on the chart right either.
But as I mentioned earlier, I'm more concerned with the probabilities of what the market is likely to do going forward. And the volatility we've seen so far only convinces me more that it will continue for the rest of 2026.
CM: What can readers expect from your 2026 Market Crash Summit that you just debuted?
GD: I dive into what and, more importantly, when I'm expecting big moves in markets this year.
I review past predictions, hear from subscribers about their experience trading alongside me, and a trade setup I'm watching over the next few weeks that has a very good winning percentage based on history.
Editor's note: In his new free presentation, Greg reveals the exact week he's expecting the market to have its next big move... talks more about his strategy and history using it... and shares one of his favorite trade setups for what he sees ahead.
It's one that has delivered an average 50% return the past three times he recommended it to subscribers. If you missed the debut of Greg's Market Crash Summit earlier this week, check it out now here. It will go offline soon.
New 52-week highs (as of 3/11/26): Antero Midstream (AM), Alpha Architect 1-3 Month Box Fund (BOXX), BP (BP), Century Aluminum (CENX), CF Industries (CF), Chord Energy (CHRD), Chevron (CVX), EOG Resources (EOG), EQT (EQT), Freehold Royalties (FRU.TO), Liberty Energy (LBRT), Marathon Petroleum (MPC), Starbucks (SBUX), USCF SummerHaven Dynamic Commodity Strategy No K-1 Fund (SDCI), and Valero Energy (VLO).
In today's mailbag, feedback on what we wrote about yesterday: "the market's next problem" – high(er) inflation and possibly interest rates... Do you have a comment or question? As always, e-mail us at feedback@stansberryresearch.com.
"It is insanity to hike rates because of an oil supply shock. Remember, the cure for higher prices is higher prices. Anyway, it won't happen because the Treasury cannot afford higher rates. This is not the 1980s..." – Subscriber S.J.I.
"... I predict [Trump] will sour on Kevin Warsh [his nominee for Federal Reserve Chair] and nominate Maria Bartiromo for Fed chief..." – Subscriber Michael S.
All the best,
Corey McLaughlin with Greg Diamond
Baltimore, Maryland
March 12, 2026
