Oil climbs for 3rd straight day, Brent tops $96 on renewed U.S.-Iran fighting

Oil prices advanced for a third straight session on Wednesday, as renewed fighting between the United States and Iran heightened fears of prolonged disruptions to crude supplies from the Middle East.

As of 20:56 ET (00:56 GMT), Brent Oil Futures expiring in November rose 1.6% to $96.18 per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures also gained 1.6% to $91.65 per barrel.

Both benchmarks jumped nearly 5% in the previous session and reached their highest levels in about five weeks.
The latest rally followed new U.S. strikes on Iranian targets and Iranian attacks on U.S. forces and commercial vessels around the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most important oil shipping routes.

The renewed confrontation has raised concern that the conflict could further restrict tanker movements through the waterway and deepen an already significant supply shock.

Tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remained extremely limited on Monday, with only five commodity vessels crossing the waterway, according to preliminary Kpler data.

The risks intensified after two supertankers carrying Saudi crude were hit by unidentified projectiles while passing through the strait on Monday. The vessels had each loaded about 2 million barrels at Saudi Arabia’s Juaymah terminal.

Iranian crude exports have also been severely curtailed. Reuters reported that Iranian crude loadings fell to between 220,000 and 255,000 barrels per day in August from about 2 million bpd in March.
Meanwhile, data showed that U.S. crude oil inventories fell by 2.6 million barrels in the week ended Aug. 28, according to data from the American Petroleum Institute released late Tuesday, reversing a 4.2 million-barrel increase in the previous week.

Gasoline inventories rose by about 300,000 barrels, while distillate stocks fell by roughly 300,000 barrels, according to the API data.

The API data preceded the more closely watched weekly report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration, due later Wednesday.