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Quantum Computing Comes for Crypto: 8 Key Items Shaping the Stock Market Friday

Oil prices climb, Lenovo’s AI server business and other headlines are moving stocks this morning.

Chris Versace·May 22, 2026, 8:49 AM EDT

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These are the early headlines and other items poised to influence the market at the start of the trading day. As we share this collection of market drivers, U.S. equity futures point to a modestly positive start to the final day of trading for this week.  

1. A record number of travelers — 3.91 million — are expected to hit the road for the holiday weekend, with what is expected to be the highest national average for gas on Memorial Day weekend in four years, according to AAA. The average, at $4.56 per gallon, is 3 cents higher than last week and $1.38 higher than Memorial Day weekend last year. (The Hill)

The unofficial start to summer is here and the holiday weekend means we’re likely to see a fade in trading volume during the afternoon market session. As of Friday morning, all four major market averages point to a positive trading week, but as we’ve become accustomed to lately, a positive week for the market could hinge on U.S.- Iran developments. 

Oil prices were rising early on Friday morning, pointing to growing doubts over whether the U.S. and Iran will reach a deal to end the war. Adding fuel to that doubt, Iran’s Supreme Leader issued a directive that the country’s near-weapons-grade uranium should not be sent abroad. On Thursday, President Trump vowed that the U.S. will not ‌allow Iran to have its stockpile of highly enriched uranium. Following the cumulative effort and cost of the conflict and Trump’s uranium sticking point, there would be quite a bit of geopolitical egg on his face if Trump pulled another TACO moment. 

2. Lenovo said its fiscal fourth-quarter ​revenue jumped 27% to $21.6 billion, ​beating analysts’ expectations ⁠of $18.7 billion, as its PC shipment growth outpaced the overall market by nearly six percentage points, it said. The group is also accelerating its push into ​the AI inference market, with its AI server order pipeline reaching $21 billion. Its infrastructure ​solutions group, ⁠which includes its AI server business, posted 37% revenue growth in the fourth quarter, the fastest among Lenovo’s business segments. (Reuters)

While Lenovo’s PC business was far stronger than expected the demand for its AI server business grew at a brisker pace. That sets the stage for quarterly results next week from Dell (DELL) as well as our own Marvell (MRVL). 

With memory prices doubling in Q1 2026 and forecasts calling for them to climb more than 60% in the current quarter, the odds of supplies for smartphones, laptops, PCs and other markets are rising. Fortunately, as part of the EPS All-Stars basket, the Pro Portfolio has some nice exposure to Micron (MU). 

3. Workday shares jumped nearly 12% premarket on Friday after the enterprise software maker beat first-quarter revenue and profit ​estimates, easing concerns that AI rivals such ‌as Anthropic could rapidly disrupt demand for traditional software vendors. Subscription revenue at the Pleasanton, California-based company jumped 14.3% to $2.35 billion, ​with net new business driving 40% of ​that growth… (Reuters)

Viewing Workday’s (WDAY) total subscription revenue backlog and 12-month subscription backlog figures tells a different story. While those metrics were up on a year over year basis, both fell compared to levels reported for Workday’s Q4 2026 results as did Q1 2027  subscription revenue. 

That doesn’t exactly scream winning new business at a time when OpenAI and Anthropic are making moves to help companies bring AI into their operations. To that end, on Thursday, Anthropic announced its acquisition of Fractional AI, an applied AI services company that focuses on end-to-end AI implementation in the enterprise. 

4. Ross Stores, the discount apparel and home accessories retailer, reported first-quarter sales and earnings that sailed over Wall Street’s expectations… The retailer said sales for the quarter rose 21% to $6.01 billion, and that same-store sales grew by “a very robust 17%.” (Barron’s)

Those are some simply eye-popping comp sales, and our take is they underscore the trade down consumers are making to combat the pinch of renewed inflation pressures. With those pressures looking to stick around well into 2H 2026, we’ll remain owners of the Portfolio’s consumer facing holdings. 

5. Oura Health Oy, a maker of smart rings that track health, fitness and sleep, filed confidentially for a U.S. initial public offering as it looks to capitalize on the growing popularity of wearable devices… Oura Chief Executive Officer Tom Hale said in September that the company had sold 5.5 million rings to date, up from 2.5 million sold through June 2024. The company expects revenue to reach $1.5 billion in 2026, tripling the $500 million it generated in 2024. (Bloomberg)

The SpaceX IPO filing, OpenAI expected to confidentially file its IPO documents with the SEC on Friday and now Oura. The backlog of high-profile IPO is building, and we’ll spare you the comment about how it will benefit the Portfolio’s financial positions. Instead, we’ll comment the OpenAI filing is a positive for our shares of SuRo Capital (SSSS), which counts OpenAI in its investment portfolio. We also see Oura’s move as clearing the way for another SuRo investment, Whoop, to become a public company. 

And since we’re likely to get the question, our view is that Pro members that own SSSS shares should vote in favor to appoint Neostellar Advisors as the investment advisor for SuRo Capital. We’ve discussed before how this partnership between SuRo and Magnetar would benefit SuRo’s investment portfolio, its net asset value and the shares. We continue to have that view ahead of the June 10 special shareholder meeting.

6. Cryptocurrency companies are preparing for the threat that powerful quantum computers could soon be able to hack the security at the heart of the global industry, including breaking the critical code that underpins bitcoin. The risk to crypto posed by fast-developing quantum technology — which exploits the way the physics of matter works differently at atomic and subatomic levels — was once considered a distant possibility…. (FT)

As we understand it, the concern is that quantum computers could potentially decrypt private keys, allowing attackers to steal funds, raising integrity questions and crypto company plans to make their business quantum secure. 

7. Economic data today per TipRanks: University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index (May)  

8. Companies reporting today per TipRanks: AM – BJ’s Wholesale (BJ), Booz Allen (BAH)

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At the time of publication, TheStreet Pro Portfolio was long MRVL and MU.