Stocks closed higher on Friday and for the week. The tech-heavy Nasdaq and S&P 500 made another new all-time high in the process. And it marked the sixth up week in a row for both. And the seventh up week in a row for the small-cap Russell 2000.

Hopes for a longer-term Middle East peace deal continue ? even while Iran and the U.S. exchange fire in the Strait of Hormuz, and other ships and surrounding Gulf States come under sporadic Iranian attack.

All the while, the ceasefire, and the U.S. blockade remain in place.

The U.S. has threatened to resume Project Freedom (where the U.S. Navy escorts 'stranded' ships out of the Strait), if no deal is reached, along with the resumption of hostilities.

Meanwhile, the U.S. is still awaiting a formal response to the latest peace plan proposal.

In other news, Friday's Employment Situation report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) came in much better than expected at 115,000 new jobs for April (123K in the private sector and -8K in the public sector), vs. the consensus for 63,000 (67K private, -4K public). The unemployment rate stayed the same at 4.2%, also as expected. And the average hourly wage growth came in at 0.2% m/m, in line with last month and under views for 0.3%. The annual rate came in at 3.6%, which was above last month's 3.5% pace, but under the consensus for 3.8%.

Revisions for the last couple of months saw February revised down by -23,000 to -156,000 (originally -133K), while March was revised up by 7,000 to 185K (originally 178K).

The biggest job gains for April came from the following: Health Care added 37,000 jobs; Transportation and Warehousing increased by 30,000; Retail jobs were up 22,000; and Social Assistance jobs gained 17,000.

The report also noted that Federal government employment, which peaked in October 2024, is down -11.5% since then or -348,000 jobs.

The stronger-than-expected BLS report underscored the strength and resiliency of the economy. And it once again proves that the AI trade is alive and well.

Also lifting markets last week (and really over the last several weeks) has been another stellar earnings season, especially from big-tech and AI related names showing impressive double-digit sales and earnings growth, along with upped guidance.

Earnings season continues this week with another 1,182 companies on deck to report, including Cisco on Wednesday and Applied Materials on Thursday.

Earnings season starts winding down next week with only 582 companies in queue to report, including AI juggernaut NVIDIA on Wednesday, 5/20, along with Analog Devices.

I mentioned this last week, but I'll mention it again. In an interview last week, legendary trader Paul Tudor Jones said the AI-driven bull market still has "another year or two to run," and compared it to the late 1990's tech boom.

That has been my sentiment all along, and comports with my expectation that we see 5 years in a row of double-digit market gains, just like we did in the 1995-1999 dot-com boom.

I'm expecting 5 years in a row of big gains due to the AI boom. This year (2026), would be year 4, while 2027 would be year 5. But nobody says it has to stop there. With AI being touted as the most transformational tech breakthrough ever, it could very well last much longer.

So make sure you're taking full advantage of it.

See you tomorrow,