Ships Are Moving In and Out of the Persian Gulf, Easing Oil Prices
Shipping traffic in the Strait of Hormuz continued to recover over the weekend, although passages through the maritime choke point remained significantly lower than before the war with Iran.
More vessels began plying the waterway after the United States and Iran agreed last month on a temporary cease-fire and began talks for a more lasting end to the conflict, which has throttled energy exports. In recent days, more ships were entering the Persian Gulf than exiting it, a shift from recent weeks, when traffic was dominated by ships leaving the gulf, according to Kpler, a maritime data company.
The recovery in the Persian Gulf, whose producers predominantly use the strait to serve global markets, has helped ease oil prices. The OPEC Plus oil cartel added to the downward pressure on prices when it announced on Sunday that it planned to pump more crude.
The durability of a U.S.-Iran peace agreement “will determine whether the global economy gets an energy-driven disinflation tailwind or absorbs a second oil shock,” said Ryan Sweet, the chief global economist at Oxford Economics.
