The stock market spent the first week of the Iran war doing something strange: mostly shrugging. Oil spiked. Insurance markets effectively collapsed. Amazon had two data centers blown up. And the Nasdaq dipped, steadied, and the conversation shifted within days to whether the Fed might still cut in June.  The prevailing read was: disruption, yes. Catastrophe, no. This thing will be over soon. I think that read is wrong.  And wrong in a specific, structural way, not because the war will necessarily escalate further, but because the damage…

Thermal batteries are the hottest new thing in energy storage tech. As energy storage heats up to be “clean energy’s next trillion-dollar business,” the private sector is throwing its full weight behind developing the technology that will unlock scalable long-term energy storage. As of 2022, the energy storage market was valued at nearly $198.8 billion, on track to reach $329.1 billion by 2032, and showing no sign of slowing from there. The race to corner that market is a contentious one, and thermal batteries are rapidly emerging…

Arend Kapteyn, the global head of economics and strategy research and chief economist at UBS, told clients that one key reason the current Middle East conflict-driven energy shock "is not like 2011-2014" will be the absence of a comparable response from the shale patch, suggesting consumers are more likely to bear the brunt of the pain.  Kapteyn noted that, on an inflation-adjusted basis, oil prices in 2011-2014 were actually higher than they are today, yet the U.S. economy absorbed that shock because the shale boom provided a lift to the…

Norwegian oil production slipped 0.2 % in February as output fell slightly by 3,000 barrels per day (bpd) compared to January, averaging 1.97 million bpd, according to preliminary figures from the Norwegian Offshore Directorate. Production came in 262 kbpd higher than a year earlier, when oil output totaled 1.708 million bpd. Total liquids production on the Norwegian continental shelf averaged 2.176 million bpd last month, including 1.97 million bpd of oil, 188,000 barrels of natural gas liquids (NGL), and 18,000 barrels of condensate. Oil output…

The total number of active drilling rigs for oil and gas in the United States fell this week, according to new data that Baker Hughes published on Friday, bringing the total rig count in the US to 552 this week, down 41 from this same time last year. The number of active oil rigs rose by 2 to 414 during the latest reporting period, according to the data. This is 72 below this same time last year. The number of gas rigs fell by 2, sinking to 131, which is 29 more than this time last year. The miscellaneous rig count fell to 7. The latest EIA data…

Oil prices pulled back Friday, but not because the market suddenly feels safe. This is more of a tactical breather than a trend change. Brent slipped back toward the $109 level, while WTI hovered in the high-$90s, easing from the week’s Thursday spike that briefly pushed Brent near $120. The trigger wasn’t a shift in fundamentals—it was policy. Washington is scrambling to throw barrels at the problem, and allies are lining up behind a coordinated effort to stabilize flows through the Strait of Hormuz, including by sending additional…

Amid the Iranian war and oil price crisis, the Department of Energy, alongside the Department of Commerce, has unveiled a public-private partnership with SoftBank and AEP Ohio that centers on one thing the AI boom desperately needs but rarely talks about plainly—power. Not theoretical power. Not intermittent power. Real, dispatchable, grid-ready megawatts, mostly from natural gas. At the core of the plan, revealed in a Friday press release, is a 10-gigawatt data center campus at the Portsmouth Site in southern Ohio, backed by an equally massive…

Amid the Iranian war and oil price crisis, the Department of Energy, alongside the Department of Commerce, has unveiled a public-private partnership with SoftBank and AEP Ohio that centers on one thing the AI boom desperately needs but rarely talks about plainly—power. Not theoretical power. Not intermittent power. Real, dispatchable, grid-ready megawatts, mostly from natural gas. At the core of the plan, revealed in a Friday press release, is a 10-gigawatt data center campus at the Portsmouth Site in southern Ohio, backed by an equally massive…

As the world braces for a potential “Battle of Hormuz” to reopen the world’s most important energy chokepoint, governments and energy markets are scrambling to answer a daunting question: What happens if the Strait of Hormuz stays closed for weeks or even months? The narrow waterway between Iran and Oman is the most critical chokepoint in the global energy system. Roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil supply moves through it every day, along with enormous volumes of natural gas and petrochemical feedstocks. In practical terms,…

Refiners in Asia are paying huge premiums for crude that could replace some of the supply stuck in the Middle East, with the most suitable grades from Norway and the U.S. being bid at record-high double-digit premiums over Dated Brent.  Many refineries in Asia, which is the most dependent region on Middle East supply, are designed to optimally run on the sour and heavier grades that the Gulf producers export. Now that most Gulf supply is either curtailed at the upstream level or stuck on tankers unable to pass the Strait of Hormuz, refiners…

Refiners in Asia are paying huge premiums for crude that could replace some of the supply stuck in the Middle East, with the most suitable grades from Norway and the U.S. being bid at record-high double-digit premiums over Dated Brent.  Many refineries in Asia, which is the most dependent region on Middle East supply, are designed to optimally run on the sour and heavier grades that the Gulf producers export. Now that most Gulf supply is either curtailed at the upstream level or stuck on tankers unable to pass the Strait of Hormuz, refiners…

Oil is heading for a fifth straight weekly gain, with Brent near $109, as the Strait of Hormuz remains shut for a third week, keeping supply tight despite policy efforts to ease the market. Friday, March 20, 2026 Oil markets are set to post their fifth consecutive weekly gain (excepting WTI which will see a minor week-over-week decline), with ICE Brent trading around $109 per barrel. Whilst the Trump administration has sought to defuse market concerns using any means available – waiving the Jones Act, easing Russian sanctions further or de-sanctioning…

Europe’s benchmark natural gas prices soared this week after Qatar’s key LNG hub sustained extensive damage in Iranian missile attacks, with European gas prices on track for a 20% weekly jump early on Friday as the market braces itself for years of disrupted supply out of the world’s second-largest LNG exporter.    The April 2026 contract of the Dutch TTF Natural Gas Futures slightly eased early on Friday from the surge on Thursday and was trading flat at about $72 (62 euros) per megawatt-hour (MWh) as…

Europe’s benchmark natural gas prices soared this week after Qatar’s key LNG hub sustained extensive damage in Iranian missile attacks, with European gas prices on track for a 20% weekly jump early on Friday as the market braces itself for years of disrupted supply out of the world’s second-largest LNG exporter.    The April 2026 contract of the Dutch TTF Natural Gas Futures slightly eased early on Friday from the surge on Thursday and was trading flat at about $72 (62 euros) per megawatt-hour (MWh) as…

When Israeli jets struck the South Pars gas complex near Asaluyeh, they hit more than pipes and compressors. They struck the single piece of infrastructure most essential to Iran's ability to function -- a field that provides 75 percent of Iran's domestic gas supply and powers roughly 80 percent of the country's electricity generation. The strike halted output at two refineries with a combined daily capacity of around 100 million cubic meters, sending prices soaring and triggering Iranian retaliatory strikes on energy infrastructure in Gulf Arab…

Cuba is set to soon receive two Russian cargoes of crude and diesel amid the U.S. energy blockade that has caused an unprecedented power crisis in the country.   The shipments from Russia, which considers Cuba as one of few “friendly countries”, could test the U.S. resolve to continue isolating energy shipments for the island. If the tankers en route to Cuba do arrive in the coming days, they would be the first Russian oil and fuel shipments to the country this year.  The tanker Anatoly Kolodkin, sanctioned by the U.S.,…

From Sunday through late Thursday, oil swung sharply as traders moved between two competing forces: escalating war risk in the Middle East and a growing policy response aimed at easing supply shortages. As of late Thursday, nearby WTI crude oil traded at $94.13, down $3.90 or 3.98%, reflecting how quickly sentiment shifted during the week. War Risk Collides With Supply Relief, Driving Violent Oil Price Swings Early in the week, crude prices moved lower as initial fears of a complete supply choke eased. Reports indicated that some tankers had begun…

Politics, Geopolitics & Conflict Trump’s “51st state” comment on Venezuela comes as the country’s power structure is being reset in a way that looks controlled, not transformed. Delcy Rodríguez has replaced longtime defense chief Vladimir Padrino López with Gustavo González López, an intelligence figure tied directly to internal security. This is more of a tightening of control over the military and surveillance apparatus at a critical time when anything could shake it. At the same time, Venezuela’s…

Everything is about leverage.  Hormuz is no longer the only story as the White House loses control of its version of the narrative. The conflict is shifting toward direct control over physical supply and the infrastructure that moves it. Washington’s answer to Hormuz is Kharg Island, through which some 90% of Iran’s oil exports moved prior to this week. The strategy here was a U.S. strike that targeted military assets but left export infrastructure intact in order to maintain it for future leverage. As long as those terminals and…

The most immediate buffer to avoid oil supply shortages—crude in floating storage—is being depleted at a rapid rate as buyers scramble to get their hands on volumes sitting on tankers that are away from the Strait of Hormuz.   Oil in floating storage has fallen to about 78 million barrels this week, from 140 million barrels at the end of last year, according to data from intelligence firm Vortexa cited by Bloomberg. Since the war in the Middle East began, the oil on water volumes have been drawing down at an estimated rate…