Here is your morning brief for Monday, March 23rd. I'm Luke Vargas for the Wall Street Journal.

Iran has just hours left to open the Strait of Hormuz or face U.S. attacks on its power plants.

President Trump issued that ultimatum over the weekend, with Iran in turn threatening to attack energy,

water, and

IT infrastructure across the Middle East. That promised reprisal has led Gulf states to try and talk

the U.S. out of the plant attacks, though it's unclear if those appeals are getting through.

Qatar is reporting that attacks on its largest LNG plant last week could take years to repair, and

will cut annual helium exports by some 14%. The gas is a critical component in semiconductor

manufacturing. Two pilots have been killed after an Air Canada express plane arriving from

Montreal collided with a firefighting vehicle shortly after landing at New York's

LaGuardia Airport. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said that the firefighting

vehicle was responding to a separate incident just before midnight. There were 72 passengers

and four crew members aboard the plane, with photos showing the front end of the plane sheared off

near its front doors.

The Federal Aviation Administration says LaGuardia will remain closed until at least 2 p.m. this

afternoon. And we're exclusively reporting that activist investor Elliott Investment Management

has taken a multi-billion dollar stake in chip designer synopsis. Elliot is planning to push the business to make more money from its software and services

to customers, including Intel, Alphabet, Tesla, and NVIDIA amid the AI boom.

Asian stocks have ended the day lower.

European stocks are down in midday trading, and U.S. stock futures are pointing to further

declines as a risk-off mood continues to grip markets this week. And we have got a lot more coverage

of the day's news on the WSJ's WOTS News podcast. You can add it to your playlist on your smart

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