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Crude oil futures settled higher on Friday as Brent gained $1.45 to reach $88.52 a barrel while West Texas Intermediate advanced $1.15 to $82.40, Reuters reported. The benchmarks recorded weekly gains of 6 percent and 5.4 percent respectively amid persistent supply concerns in the Middle East. Reuters data showed the advance came despite builds in U.S. inventories that reached their largest weekly increase in more than three and a half years.
The price surge followed reports that Iranian forces attacked two vessels operated by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company in the Strait of Hormuz with no injuries recorded, the United Arab Emirates government said via its state news agency. The United States signaled it could maintain a naval blockade of Iranian ports indefinitely while applying unprecedented economic pressure as ceasefire negotiations made little headway, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated on a Newsmax program. Shipping traffic through the waterway that carries one fifth of global oil and liquefied natural gas supplies fell below monthly averages as the rival claims created uncertainty, Reuters noted.
Andrew Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates, told Reuters that the market saw a rally going into the weekend after new attacks on tankers and lack of progress on a cease fire agreement. Lipow warned that a day of reckoning may come if traffic in the strait remains constrained given its critical role in global supply chains. He added that while crude oil prices might be $80 a barrel diesel prices are $180 a barrel and gasoline is $130 a barrel and that is what is hitting the consumer.
Phil Flynn, senior analyst for Price Futures Group, said that the headline that pushed up prices was tankers attacked. Flynn pointed to the suspension of crude oil exports from Russia’s Sheskharis terminal at the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk following a drone attack as an additional factor supporting prices. The incidents compounded disruptions at one of Russia’s key export outlets according to sources familiar with the matter cited by Reuters.
Offsetting pressures emerged from demand side data with OPEC lowering its forecast for global oil demand growth in 2026 while the International Energy Agency and U.S. Energy Information Administration highlighted resilient storage levels. Norbert Rucker, head of economics and next generation research at Julius Baer, said this week’s reports by the IEA and EIA were quite revealing as storage is holding up much better than feared which should pull oil prices lower. The mixed signals left traders focused on the immediate geopolitical risks in the Gulf region.
The developments occurred against a backdrop of volatile trading in recent sessions where Brent had traded near $87.55 per barrel earlier in the week before climbing above $90 at points amid escalating rhetoric. Market participants continued to monitor potential impacts on consumer fuel costs as refined product prices outpaced the rise in benchmark crude. Reuters correspondents in Houston, New Delhi and Perth compiled the reporting with editing by a team including Mark Potter and Barbara Lewis.
