More than 100 homes damaged by tornado near Houston

HOUSTON (AP) — More than 100 homes have been damaged after a tornado touched down in a residential area outside Houston, authorities in Texas said Monday.

No injuries were reported.

Photos and drone video posted on Facebook by the Harris County Precinct 4 constable showed roofs with shingles ripped off. Some debris blocked roads.

The damage affected the Memorial Northwest neighborhood, according to the office of Mark Herman, the constable.

The Houston Fire Department dispatched five members of its saw team to cut up and remove toppled trees, spokesperson Rustin Rawlings said.

The National Weather Service issued a tornado watch for southeastern Texas, including Houston, until 1 a.m. Tuesday. It also issued a severe thunderstorm warning for parts of southeastern Texas.

This story has been corrected to show that Herman is constable of Harris County Precinct 4, not Precinct 3.

Jose Rosas surveys damage to Guillermo Vargas' home as while helping clean up storm damage in the Memorial Northwest subdivision, in Spring, Texas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)

Jose Rosas, left, and Guillermo Vargas survey damage to Vargas' home as they clean up storm damage in the Memorial Northwest subdivision in Spring, Texas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)

Quinn Ocker, left, and Aidan Bartlow work on installing a tarp over a blown our window in Ocker's bedroom after severe weather hit in the Memorial Northwest subdivision, in Spring, Texas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)

A Christmas tree was sucked out the back window of Guillermo Vargas' home after at storm swept through the Memorial Northwest subdivision, in Spring, Texas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)

Guillermo Vargas surveys damage to his home, where his garage was swept off its foundation, while cleaning up storm damage after severe weather hit in the Memorial Northwest subdivision, in Spring, Texas, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)

NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks are rushing higher worldwide, and oil prices are easing Wednesday as hopes build that the war with Iran could end soon. That's even though some of the signals investors saw as hopeful are already under dispute, and several prior bouts of optimism in financial markets quickly got undercut by continued, fierce fighting in the war.

The S&P 500 rallied 0.9% and added to its leap from the day before, which was its best since last spring. That followed even bigger gains for stock markets across Europe and Asia, including an 8.4% surge in South Korea, which were catching up to Wall Street’s rally from Tuesday.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 294 points, or 0.6%, as of 2:08 p.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 1.3% higher.

Oil prices also fell back toward $100 per barrel after President Donald Trump said late Tuesday that the U.S. military could end its offensive in two to three weeks.

That added to optimism following a couple tenuous signals of hope from earlier Tuesday that Wall Street latched onto, including a news report quoting Iran’s president as saying that it has “the necessary will to end the war” as long as certain requirements are met, including “guarantees to prevent a recurrence of aggression.”

The worry on Wall Street has been that the war may last a long time and keep oil and natural gas from the Persian Gulf out of global markets, which could create a brutal blast of inflation.

But hope has been quick to reverse to doubt on Wall Street, triggering manic swings back and forth for financial markets since the war with Iran began. Trump has also made statements that lifted markets, only to see the gains quickly disappear after increasing his military threats.

Shortly before Wall Street began trading on Wednesday, Trump claimed in a post on his social media network that Iran “has just asked the United States of America for a CEASEFIRE!”

“We will consider when Hormuz Strait is open, free, and clear. Until then, we are blasting Iran into oblivion or, as they say, back to the Stone Ages!!!”

But Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Esmail Baghaei, quickly called that claim “false and baseless,” according to a report on Iranian state television.

Oil prices also remain high, even if they’ve eased recently. The price for a barrel of Brent crude oil, the international standard, was sitting at $101.51 following its declines, which is still up from roughly $70 before the war began.

U.S. gasoline prices rose again overnight to a national average of $4.06 per gallon, according to the auto club AAA.

Iran, meanwhile, hit an oil tanker off the coast of Qatar and Kuwait’s airport on Wednesday while airstrikes battered Tehran as the fighting continued. Iran also continues to hold a grip on the Strait of Hormuz, where a fifth of the world’s traded oil passes during peacetime.

“De-escalation hopes have given markets a lift, but we think the effects of the war would, in many cases, persist even if the war did end soon,” Thomas Mathews, head of markets, Asia Pacific at Capital Economics, said in a research note Wednesday.

“It’s worth thinking through how markets might fare if the war were to end ‘very soon,’” he wrote. “Do markets have further to recover if sentiment continues to improve? The answer is almost certainly yes.”

The White House said Trump will deliver a public address Wednesday evening on the Iran war.

On Wall Street, most stocks rose as Big Tech powered the move higher. Gains of 3.8% for Alphabet and 0.8% for Nvidia were two of the strongest forces lifting the S&P 500.

Eli Lilly climbed 5.1% after U.S. regulators approved its GLP-1 pill for weight loss.

Such gains have pulled the S&P 500, which sits at the heart of many 401(k) accounts, back to within 5.6% of its all-time high set early this year. Just on Monday, the index briefly neared a 10% drop from its record, a steep-enough fall that professional investors have a name for it: a “correction.”

Nike sank 14.5% even though it reported a stronger profit for the latest quarter than expected. Analysts said it gave some lackluster financial forecasts.

Hasbro fell 4.8% after the toy company found someone had gained unauthorized access to its computer network and is working to assess the full impact.

Energy companies fell broadly as oil prices eased. Exxon Mobil slumped 5% and Chevron fell 4.9%.

In stock markets abroad, indexes leaped more than 2% in France and Germany. Asian markets had even bigger gains.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 jumped 5.2% after a survey showed business sentiment for major Japanese manufacturers improved despite worries about the Iran war.

In the bond market, Treasury yields held relatively steady after a report said U.S. retailers made more money in February than economists expected. A separate report said U.S. manufacturing growth last month was slightly faster than economists expected.

The 10-year Treasury yield rose to 4.32% from 4.30% late Tuesday.

AP Business Writers Chan Ho-him and Matt Ott contributed.

James Conti works on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Philip Finale works on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), top center, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top center left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Currency traders work at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A currency trader reacts near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), right, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A screen displays financial information on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)