Oil prices hit their highest level in weeks after US President Donald Trump cut off talks with Iran for the foreseeable future on Tuesday, and Tehran said the Strait of Hormuz would remain shut amid stalled negotiations.
US retail gas prices hit their highest-ever August levels this week, but “the global economy’s apparent success in adapting to the [strait’s] closure suggests the US can afford to wait,” Eurasia Group analysts wrote.
While a small but steady stream of oil continues to flow out of the Gulf, global consumers can’t afford for oil traders to get too comfortable with tenuous security in the strait, a Kpler analyst argued in Semafor Gulf: “The bigger risk is that uncertainty becomes the new reality.”