News

Azerbaijan said it had prevented several acts of "terrorist" sabotage planned by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), including a plot to attack a major oil pipeline running through the South Caucasus to Turkey. The targets included the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline, the Israeli embassy in Azerbaijan, an Ashkenazi synagogue, and a leader an ancient Jewish community in Azerbaijan called the Mountain Jews, according to a State Security Service statement cited by the Azertag [Read more]

The White House is asking federal agencies to step up efforts to address soaring energy prices from the Iran conflict, signaling a concern that steps taken so far may not be enough, according to two people familiar with the matter. Senior officials have asked the departments of Energy, Transportation and Treasury and the Environmental Protection Agency to provide more policy options, with an emphasis on measures that President Donald Trump could implement without congressional approval, one of [Read more]

U.S. Gulf Coast heavy grades continued to surge on Friday as the Iran conflict spurred several Middle Eastern producers of heavy crude to curtail production and drove buyers to scoop up U.S. barrels. Prices of Mars sour crude, the flagship crude produced in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico and favored by refiners globally, traded at a $11 premium to U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude on Friday, brokers said. That was the highest since April 2020, and up $4 from Thursday. Just a week [Read more]

Goldman Sachs said oil prices are likely to exceed $100 per barrel next week if no signs of a solution emerge to the severe disruption in flows through the Strait of Hormuz, warning that upside risks to its base-case forecast are rapidly growing further. The bank said it plans to revisit its oil price forecast soon if it does not see evidence supporting its assumption of a gradual normalization in Strait of Hormuz flows over the next few days. Its current base-case Brent forecast is in the [Read more]

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on Friday said the United States could remove sanctions from more Russian oil, a day after Washington issued a 30-day waiver allowing the sale of Russian crude currently stranded at sea to continue to India. "We may unsanction other Russian oil," Bessent told Fox Business' "Kudlow" program. "There are hundreds of millions of sanctioned barrels of sanctioned crude on the water and in essence, by unsanctioning them, Treasury can create supply, and we are looking [Read more]

Faster approvals. Faster projects. A new agreement will restore provincial approvals on projects within the province’s jurisdiction, reduce duplication, and further unlock Alberta’s economic potential.   On this page: Quick facts Related information Related news The governments of Canada and Alberta have worked collaboratively to reach an agreement-in-principle on a Cooperation Agreement on Environmental and Impact Assessment that will see major [Read more]

Barclays said on Friday that Brent crude could potentially test $120 a barrel if the Middle East conflict persists for another couple of weeks. "These numbers might seem too high, especially given widespread pessimism about the oil market outlook heading into this year, but we reiterate that fundamentals are stronger and risks are bigger than the Russia​-​Ukraine conflict, when we saw these levels materialize," Barclays added. Oil prices have jumped sharply as the widening U.S.-Israeli [Read more]