Wall Street went through a red day yesterday of a kind not seen in a long while, and the cause is a combination anyone in the Balkans understands instinctively: expensive oil and disappointing results from the tech giants. When New York sneezes, the world reaches for tissues - and the inflation fear, it seems, is back on the table.

The indices fell across the board. The Dow Jones lost 0.97 percent, the S&P 500 dropped 1.21 percent, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq sank 2.15 percent. The trigger for the sell-off was two names: Tesla shares plunged about 14 percent, and Alphabet, Google's parent company, lost seven percent after announcing capital expenditure of 195 to 205 billion dollars for artificial intelligence investment.

The second wing of the crisis came from the Middle East. After attacks on tankers in the Red Sea and threats of strikes on Iranian targets, Brent crude jumped about 7 percent and crossed the 100-dollar-a-barrel line. And when oil gets more expensive, the inflation fear doesn't stay in New York - it travels with every truck, ship and plane.

The markets instantly recalculated the consequence: the probability that the US central bank will raise rates in September leapt to over 80 percent, from around half only a week earlier. Yields on ten-year US bonds briefly topped 4.7 percent. In other words - money is getting more expensive again.

For a Balkan who still remembers how the energy shock of a few years ago tore apart the electricity and heating bills, news like this is not abstract stock-market statistics. Expensive oil and higher interest rates are a language the region knows by heart. The question isn't whether it will reach us - but how long it will take.