1. Europe's momentum is fading.

Citi's euro zone economic surprise metric, which measures how economic data in the prior three months differs from consensus forecasts, is firmly in negative territory, in contrast to other major economies such as the U.S., China and the UK.
"Every additional day of disruption shifts the balance of risk towards higher-for-longer energy prices and, eventually, demand destruction," write Barclays equity strategists in a note.
Yet, they don't believe it's all bad.
"We see the war reinforcing the need to accelerate investments in strategic autonomy, which we think remains a compelling medium term investment theme."

2. Asian optimism over corporate earnings overshadowes concerns about the Middle East conflict.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan is hovering near the record high.
The index is on course for a 17% rise in April after dropping 13.5% in March.

3. Forecasts for the S&P remain (very) bullish.

Strategists at major investment banks expect momentum in artificial intelligence and strong corporate earnings to offset the conflict's short-term economic impact.
Here are the S&P 500 forecasts.

4. Terafab aims to rival the scale of the largest chipmaker in the world, TSMC.

Musk’s latest moonshot is a sprawling, vertically integrated chip-making operation called Terafab.
Musk’s targets for the Terafab have been characteristically fabulous: Mass production is supposed to start next year, with an initial target of 100,000 silicon wafers a month. If all goes to plan, it will grow to a million wafers a month.
TSMC Chief Executive dismissed Musk’s timeline without explicitly rejecting the venture altogether. “It takes two to three years to build a new fab, no shortcuts,” he said. “And it takes another one to two years to ramp it up.”

5. Exposure to the European data center theme.

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