by Vasily Fedorov
[REGNUM] On March 1, the tanker Skylight, a Palau-flagged vessel carrying oil from the Iraqi port of Basra, caught fire and began to sink in the waters off Oman's Musandam Peninsula. There were 20 people on board: 15 Indians and five Iranians. All were evacuated, but four were injured.
A few hours later, another oil tanker, the MKD Vyom, sailing under the Marshall Islands flag, was hit by a shell 80 km northwest of Muscat.
Until this day, strikes on tankers in the Strait of Hormuz remained the stuff of analytical reports. Now, power outages are no longer hypothetical.
The situation around the strait was already alarming by this point. On February 28, immediately after the US and Israeli strikes on Iran began, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) issued a brief VHF message: the passage was closed and all movement was prohibited. The US Navy responded by sending out its own warning, stating that it could not guarantee the safety of shipping.
By Sunday evening, at least 150 tankers were stranded on both sides of the strait. Major oil traders suspended shipments without announcing a resumption date.
THE BOTTLENECK OF GLOBAL ENERGY
The Strait of Hormuz is a strip of water just over 160 kilometers long. At its narrowest point, the distance between the shores is no more than 33 kilometers, and each shipping lane is approximately 3 kilometers wide. The strait is sandwiched between the Iranian coast and Oman's Musandam Peninsula—and a good fifth of the world's oil flows through this gap.
According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), approximately 20 million barrels of oil and petroleum products were shipped through the strait daily in 2024, equivalent to approximately 20% of global consumption.
The analytics company Kpler estimates crude oil transit in 2025 at over 14 million barrels per day, while Bloomberg cites a figure of 16.7 million, including condensate. Approximately three-quarters of this volume is destined for China, India, Japan, and South Korea.
In addition to oil, gas also flows through the strait—up to 30% of global liquefied natural gas exports pass through this route. Qatar is the main supplier, accounting for a fifth of global LNG shipments. Qatari LNG carriers have no alternative routes.
What about the other Gulf countries? Saudi Arabia has a pipeline to a terminal on the Red Sea coast with a capacity of up to 5 million barrels per day. The UAE has built the Habshan-Fujairah pipeline to the Omani coast, with a capacity of 1.5 million barrels.
Iraq can transport oil through Turkey to the Mediterranean, but only from its northern fields. Kuwait, Qatar, and Bahrain have no alternatives at all.
In total, all bypass capacities cover no more than 16-17% of the daily transit through Hormuz. This means that with a complete blockade of the strait, it is physically impossible to replace the lost volumes with pipelines.
PRICE SCENARIOS: FROM NERVOUSNESS TO DISASTER
The market reaction to Saturday's events is still to come—regular trading on ICE Futures and Comex was not conducted on March 1. But experts are already vying to outline the range of possible consequences.
If shipping resumes within days, American analysts expect a rise of $3-5 per barrel—unpleasant, but tolerable. Petr Shcherbachenko of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation believes Brent will reach $100, and the dollar will surpass 77 rubles. Stanislav Lazovsky of the IMEMO RAS specifically points out that if Iran uses mines, it will take months to clear them, which alone will add $10-15 to the price.
Kpler senior analyst Muyu Xu calculated last summer that closing the strait for at least a day would push Brent into the $120–$150 range.
Rabobank expert Florence Schmitt predicts that even partial disruptions to shipping could cut transit oil traffic in half, while a complete shutdown for a week would cause a spike to $140 per barrel—a shock comparable to the energy crisis of early 2022.
Finally, the most alarmist scenario: a prolonged blockade could drive prices up to $250-300.
According to former White House energy adviser Bob McNally, a prolonged closure of the strait would inevitably trigger a global economic downturn.
Jorge Leon of Rystad Energy, a former OPEC secretariat official, warns that markets will remain tense until there is confidence in the security of regional shipping lanes.
The level of anxiety can also be gauged by insurers. The Financial Times reports that leading companies are canceling policies for transit through the Strait of Hormuz, while insurance costs for the few that do take the risk have skyrocketed.
BETWEEN DEFICIT AND DIPLOMACY
Against this backdrop, an emergency online meeting of eight OPEC+ countries—Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, the UAE, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria, and Oman—was held. The countries agreed that quotas would be increased by 206,000 barrels per day starting in April—significantly more than the 137,000 barrels per day considered before the Middle East escalation.
Formally, the participants explained the decision by citing stable macroeconomic prospects and low commercial oil reserves. The context, however, is clear: the alliance is preparing to offset potential shortfalls in Iranian exports and reduce the risk of a price shock.
Notably, according to Bloomberg, Saudi Arabia and the UAE had already increased shipments before Saturday's strikes, in anticipation of supply disruptions. The next G8 meeting is scheduled for April 5.
The situation around the Strait of Hormuz is changing literally by the hour. On the morning of March 1, General Mohsen Rezaei, Secretary of Iran's Expediency Discernment Council, announced that the strait was open to commercial tankers "until further notice," but immediately warned that American warships were legitimate targets.
By mid-day, the IRGC announced the start of the seventh and eighth waves of retaliatory operations. Tehran's ambivalent signals—"the strait is open, but we're shooting"—do not inspire confidence among shipowners.
India has already emphasized that its oil imports are sufficiently diversified. Japan, which receives approximately 75% of its imported oil through the Strait of Hormuz, has introduced subsidies for gas stations in case of a price collapse.
Beijing, the largest buyer of Iranian oil and an active user of its veto in the UN Security Council to protect Tehran from Western sanctions, has so far declined to comment.
For decades, the possibility of a blockade of the Strait of Hormuz existed as a theoretical trump card in Iranian foreign policy – ​​an argument of deterrence that many in the West dismissed as a bluff.
But what's happening now is no bluff. Two damaged tankers, 150 anchored vessels, soaring insurance rates, and emergency OPEC+ talks—all this demonstrates how quickly a narrow strip of water at the intersection of Iran, Oman, and the UAE can turn into a source of global economic turmoil.
Global markets open on Monday, and the scale of the alarm will become clear from the first quotes.