Oil prices give up previous gains as tankers continue to ply Middle East conflict zones
Oil prices dipped as shipping continues through Middle Eastern conflict zones despite escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iran. Analysts suggest that alternative shipping routes are beginning to erode Iran's strategic leverage over the Strait of Hormuz.
Why it matters
The stability of global oil prices and shipping routes is critical to the world economy, particularly as geopolitical conflicts in the Middle East intensify.
Oil prices gave up some of their gains on Thursday as oil tankers continued to make their way out of the Middle East even as tensions there escalated, with the U.S.-Iran war spreading beyond its main fronts.
Brent futures fell US$1.29 (HK$10.06), or 1.42 percent, to US$89.45 a barrel as of 0110 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude fell 56 cents, or 0.66 percent, to US$83.90 a barrel. Brent settled up 7.91 percent in the previous session and WTI up 6.56 percent in one of the sharpest spikes of the Iran war, reversing a 5 percent plunge on Tuesday after a pause in hostilities in the five-month conflict.
Thirty-nine commodity ships passed through the Bab el-Mandeb strait into the Red Sea on Tuesday, the highest number since July 19, with only a few transiting through the Strait of Hormuz, preliminary shipping data showed.
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