Trump announced<\/a> that he was \u201creinstating the Iranian blockade\u201d in the Strait of Hormuz. That blockade is \u201cagainst vessels transiting to or from Iranian ports and coastal areas,\u201d the U.S. military said.<\/p>\nTrump also said last week that the U.S. would seek to be \u201creimbursed, at the rate of 20% on all cargo shipped.\u201d Shipping companies and international maritime organizations quickly rejected the idea as a violation of international law.<\/p>\n
But the uncertainty continued. Although Trump said he would drop the fee, oil continued rising on near daily U.S. strikes against Iran, as well as Iranian retaliation.<\/p>\n
It all centers on the struggle for control over the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway through which 20% of the world\u2019s energy supplies typically transit on their way to global markets.<\/p>\n
\u201cRather than pursuing full closure, Tehran appears intent on establishing authority over navigation itself through mandatory transit protocols and transit fees,\u201d JPMorgan Chase commodities analyst Natasha Kaneva wrote Thursday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe back-and-forth is hardening into a standoff over who controls the Strait, and has abruptly stalled the traffic recovery that began in early June,\u201d Kaneva continued. <\/p>\n
Last week, ship crossings in the strait dropped to a three-week low, according to data from MarineTraffic and Kpler.<\/p>\n
On Thursday, just eight ships crossed the strait, a stark drop from the average of 130 ships that transited every day before the war started.<\/p>\n
\u201cDevelopments in the Russia-Ukraine war are playing more of a role recently too,\u201d HSBC commodities analysts wrote.<\/p>\n
\u201cRussia, the world\u2019s second-largest exporter of diesel after the U.S., banned exports of key refined products on 8 July, until end-July, as a growing share of Russian refining capacity has been knocked out amid escalating attacks on its energy infrastructure by Ukraine,\u201d they wrote. \u201cThis is on top of existing restrictions on most shipments of gasoline and jet fuel.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since the start of the year, U.S. crude and Brent oil prices have now risen about 45%.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the same time, Russia is also now looking to import diesel itself; so there is less supply, and more demand in the global market,\u201d the analysts added.<\/p>\n
Jet fuel prices are also rising again.<\/p>\n
Before the Iran war, jet fuel averaged $2.50 per gallon. As of Friday, that price was nearly 43% higher, at $3.57 per gallon, according to data from the Argus U.S. jet fuel index.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Friday, oil prices posted their second straight weekly gain. Last week alone, U.S. crude oil and international…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":774136,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[28],"class_list":["post-774135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=774135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/774136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=774135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=774135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=774135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}