By Yuka Obayashi<\/p>\n
TOKYO, April 16 (Reuters) – Oil prices fell in early trade on Thursday as hopes for easing U.S.-Iran tensions, following reports that Iran could allow ships \u200cto pass through around the Strait of Hormuz, outweighed concerns over ongoing supply disruptions.<\/p>\n
Brent \u200ccrude futures dropped 44 cents, or 0.5%, to $94.49 a barrel at 0021 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures \u200bwas down 70 cents, or 0.8%, at $90.59 a barrel.<\/p>\n
Both benchmarks settled little changed on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
The White House expressed optimism on Wednesday about reaching a deal to end the war with Iran, while also warning of increasing economic pressure against Tehran if it remains defiant.<\/p>\n
A source briefed by Tehran told Reuters \u200cthat Iran could consider allowing ships \u2060to sail freely through the Omani side of the Strait of Hormuz if a deal was reached to prevent renewed conflict.<\/p>\n
“While there are hopes for \u2060de-escalation, many investors remain sceptical, given that U.S.-Iran talks have repeatedly broken down even after appearing to make progress,” said Toshitaka Tazawa, an analyst at Fujitomi Securities.<\/p>\n
“Until a peace deal is reached and free \u200bnavigation through \u200bthe strait is restored, WTI prices are expected \u200bto continue fluctuating between $80 and $100,” he added.<\/p>\n
The \u200cU.S.-Israeli war with Iran has resulted in the largest-ever disruption of global oil and gas supplies due to Iran’s interruption of traffic through the strait, which handles about 20% of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas flows.<\/p>\n
U.S. and Iranian officials were weighing a return to Pakistan for further talks as early as the coming weekend, after negotiations ended on Sunday without a breakthrough. \u200cMediator Pakistan’s army chief arrived in Tehran on Wednesday \u200bto try to prevent a renewal of the conflict.<\/p>\n
The \u200bU.S. has enacted a blockade of shipping \u200bleaving Iranian ports that its military said has completely halted trade going \u200cin and out of the country by \u200bsea.<\/p>\n
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent \u200bsaid on Wednesday that Washington will not be renewing the waivers that allowed the purchase of some Iranian and Russian oil without facing U.S. sanctions.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the U.S. Energy Information \u200bAdministration said on Wednesday that \u200ccrude inventories fell by 913,000 barrels to 463.8 million barrels in the week ended \u200bApril 10, compared with analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll for a 154,000-barrel \u200brise.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Yuka Obayashi TOKYO, April 16 (Reuters) – Oil prices fell in early trade on Thursday as hopes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":394601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[114,85,87,46,6807,114994],"class_list":{"0":"post-394600","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-iran","11":"tag-israel","12":"tag-oil-prices","13":"tag-strait-of-hormuz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=394600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}