With uncertainty rising faster than a gushing oil well, oil prices gained Tuesday as the world waited to see if peace talks resumed with Iran or whether President Trump would carry out his threats as promised.
The president’s cease fire comes to an end this week and while Iran’s military said one thing and its civilian leaders said another, Brent crude oil rose 3% and closed Tuesday at $98.36 a barrel….just under $100.
West Texas Intermediate crude rose 2.3% and finished the day at $89.44 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
At one point in the day, WTI gained nearly 6% and Brent went up more than 4%.
The gains reversed last week’s plunge in prices as the two sides held peace talks in Pakistan but it remains murky whether they were agreeable to return to the talks on Tuesday. The Strait of Hormuz is still being blocked by U.S. Navy ships and the Navy’s seizure of one Iranian cargo ship prompted Iran to state, “Blockading Iranian ports is an act of war and thus a violation of the ceasefire. Striking a commercial vessel and taking its crew hostage is an even greater violation,” Iran’s foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said on X.
Meanwhile, natural gas prices rose too, going up $0.015 or 0.56% on Tuesday before settling at $2.689 MMBtu.
Fuel prices in the U.S. fell, with the nation’s gasoline price averaging $4.02, a drop of 9 cents in the past week. Oklahoma’s average of $3.37 per gallon was down 7 cents in the past several days. Oklahoma City’s average of $3.31 was down 12 cents and the average in Tulsa, $3.37, was down 7 cents from a week ago.
By a slim margin, most Oklahoma energy stocks wrapped on the day in positive territory. Helmerich & Payne had a strong day with a gain of nearly 6%.
On the down side, Stardust Power lost 7% for the day.