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U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said on Thursday global oil prices are unlikely to hit $200 a barrel even as crude tankers remained stalled in the Strait of Hormuz and the U.S. and Israeli war with Iran widened. "I would say unlikely, but we are focused on the military operation and solving a problem," Wright told CNN when asked if prices would reach $200 a barrel - a level prices could hit if the war continues to escalate, an Iranian official said on Wednesday. "Get ready for the oil [Read more]

Iranian crude oil has continued to flow through the Strait of Hormuz at a near-normal pace even as Tehran-linked attacks on ships in the narrow waterway have decimated exports from other Gulf countries, a Reuters review of tanker tracking data showed. Iran has exported about 13.7 million barrels of crude oil since Israel and the U.S. launched attacks on the country on February 28, according to analysis from TankerTrackers.com, a maritime intelligence company that specializes in tracking the [Read more]

Norway's maritime authority said on Thursday that Norwegian-flagged ships will not be permitted to enter the Strait of Hormuz until further notice, due to the escalatingsecurity situation after the U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran. "Given how the situation has developed, it is important for us to emphasise that we are now moving from a strong recommendation regarding shipping traffic in the area to a ban," the authority said in a statement. For any ships already within the Strait of Hormuz [Read more]

Investors are turning to Canada’s resource-rich stock market for shelter from the turmoil around artificial intelligence — and on hopes the new technology will ultimately boost productivity for some of its biggest names. Shares of software and other companies with business models considered vulnerable to replacement by AI have been selling off for months, dragging down major indexes like the S&P 500, the U.S. benchmark. But the TSX is packed with the type of capital-intensive, economically [Read more]

The "Trump always chickens out" investment strategy - buying beaten-down stocks on the assumption that the U.S. president will ultimately back down from his more extreme policies - has, for the most part, been a profitable one. But the Iran war may change that. The joint U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran on February 28 has sparked war across the Middle East, triggering the biggest energy shock since the 1970s and record volatility in oil and gas. So far, U.S. equities have been remarkably calm, [Read more]

Iraq will keep crude oil production at around 1.4 million barrels per day, Oil Minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani was quoted as saying on Thursday, less than a third of the level before the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran. According to the state news agency, the minister said that 200,000 bpd is being transported by truck through Turkey, Syria, and Jordan and that Iraq has put in place a plan to manage the current disruptions. Oil production from Iraq's ⁠main southern oilfields, where most of its [Read more]

The war in the Middle East is creating the biggest oil supply disruption in history, the International Energy Agency said on Thursday, a day after it agreed to release a record volume from strategic stockpiles to offset shortages and a spike in prices. Global supply is expected to drop by 8 million barrels per day in March, the IEA said in its latest monthly oil market report - a volume equal to almost 8% of world demand - due to the blocking of the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow channel along [Read more]

The U.S. plans to release 172 million barrels of oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve, more than 40% of a wider release coordinated with allies, to help dampen prices spiked by supply disruptions from the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. The U.S. sale, announced late on Wednesday, is part of a 400-million-barrel release by members of the International Energy Agency. The U.S. Department of Energy said the U.S. drawdown would begin next week and take about four months. The SPR currently holds [Read more]