Please stay tuned for important disclosure information at the conclusion of this episode.

Hello and welcome to the Morning Filter podcast.

I'm Susan Jubinsky with Morningstar.

Every Monday before market open, I sit down with Morningstar Chief U.S.

market strategist Dave Sikara to talk about what investors should have on their radars for the week, some new Morning Star

Research, and a few stock ideas.

Well, good morning, Dave.

Let's talk about the Iran War and the markets starting with oil.

So where are oil prices as we're taping this Monday before market open?

And what's the oil futures change showing in terms of how long the war is expected to last?

Hey, good morning, Susan. Now, actually, before I get into what oil prices have done over the course of the weekend,

I just want to make sure people understand crude oil future contracts to some degree. So what I want to read here on screen exactly when the last trade date is. So crude oil futures

contracts expire on the third business day prior to the 25th calendar day of the month preceding

delivery month. So what does that mean? Well, if you look at the April 2026 oil futures contract, the last trade date for that contract is March 19th. And then next month, the last trade date for the May 2026 contract is then April 21st. So if you take a look at the April 2026 oil futures contract, it's about $97 this morning. That's a dollar lower than where they were

last Friday, but it's up still $2 from where they were Monday last week. Now, as we've discussed,

it is also important to take a look at the futures strip. So what I've seen over the past week is

the price for the May contract has increased more

than the April contract.

So the spread between those two months has now declined to about a dollar from well over

$3 last week.

So what that actually means is that the market is pricing in a higher probability. Hostilities are going to last longer in the April than what was priced in the prior week.

Now, there's still a pretty big drop between the May and the June contract.

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