Iran is now telling American investors not to believe what Trump says

It’s an extraordinary move, one that appears to blend online flame wars with actual wars.

Hours ahead of Monday’s market open, the man the U.S. is reportedly trying to negotiate with to end a five-week-old war — Iran's parliamentary speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf — offered tips to American investors.

“Pre-market so-called 'news' or 'Truth' is often just a setup for profit-taking,” Ghalibaf posted Sunday. “Basically, it's a reverse indicator. Do the opposite: If they pump it, short it. If they dump it, go long. See something tomorrow? You know the drill.”

In other words, Ghalibaf told U.S. investors to treat President Donald Trump’s statements about the war as contrary indicators — the opposite of the truth, and to make trades that assume Trump’s statements are contrary indications of market direction. He also pointed to a pattern of profitable trades that have emerged following major policy announcements made by Trump on social media.

Ghalibaf’s post got 8 million views, as of this writing, and the timing is not coincidental. Last Monday morning, just as the trading week kicked off, Trump took to Truth Social in an all-caps post claiming that the U.S. and Iran were engaged in direct talks and that a “complete and total resolution of hostilities” was imminent. Futures shot up on the news while the price of oil fell. Many news outlets ran with the story, suggesting that “peace talks” were occurring based on Trump’s claims, even as those claims flew in the face of the 40-year history of U.S.-Iranian hostilities and Iran's own immediate denial.

Only late on Monday did The Wall Street Journal establish what appears to have actually taken place: indirect talks, with Middle East intermediaries working to find officials in Iran to negotiate with while privately expressing skepticism that any resolution is imminent. In separate reporting, The Journal covered the pattern of well timed trades that profited from dramatic policy shifts since Trump’s second term began – often minutes or hours before the policy shift was announced by Trump.

That an Iranian official is commenting on the same phenomenon in slangy English on X $TWTR and calling attention to it completes, for now, an extraordinary news cycle.

Trump posted fresh threats on Truth Social on Monday morning, claiming in all caps that the U.S. is in "serious discussions with a new, and more reasonable, regime" in Iran — while threatening to destroy Iranian power plants, oil wells, Kharg Island, and, in his words, "possibly all desalination plants."