Oil & Gas Corner

Monday, 2026-10-26 · covering the last 72h

Market signal

Brent gives back part of the weekend spike as traders weigh a possible cooling in the Saudi-Iran escalation. Brent pushed above $116/bbl into Sunday's open before easing roughly 2% on Monday to the mid-$114s, with WTI slipping a similar amount to around $101; the pullback reflects hopes that the latest round of Houthi and Hormuz claims won't escalate further, not any resolution of the underlying conflict. FinanceFeeds · HDFC Sky

Upstream — exploration & production

No confirmed new strikes on Saudi oil infrastructure over the weekend beyond Friday's Yanbu and Riyadh Defence Ministry claims, which Riyadh still hasn't corroborated. OPEC+'s eight voluntary producers hold their next policy call on November 1. No other material production, licensing, FID or M&A news crossed the wire in the window.

Midstream — pipelines, LNG & shipping

October is the worst month for Hormuz tanker attacks since the Iran war began, a Washington Institute tracker shows. At least 28 reported and confirmed attacks on shipping in and around the strait have been logged so far this month — more than double the average since the conflict started on February 28 — even as the daily pace has slowed from the first half of October. Seatrade Maritime

A growing share of Hormuz transits are running dark to dodge the strikes. Tankers are increasingly switching off their AIS trackers and moving at night under US naval protection before transferring cargo further out in the Gulf of Oman, a pattern that is making it harder for traders and analysts to independently verify how much crude is actually moving. gCaptain

Downstream — refining, fuels & chemicals

Russia's first US-bound diesel cargo under the new sanctions carve-out has sailed. Treasury's OFAC issued General License 135 on October 9 authorizing transactions in Russian-origin diesel through April 7, 2027, following Trump's call with Putin in which Russia pledged an initial 300,000 tonnes followed by 500,000 tonnes in November; the first tanker, roughly 40,000 tonnes, departed in the days after. Refiner shares (Valero, PBF, Marathon Petroleum) slipped on the news as the import carve-out threatens to add competing barrels to a tight US diesel market just as the margin squeeze had been easing. OFAC General License 135 · OilPrice.com · Benzinga

The diesel shortage is a refining problem, not a crude problem, and it isn't fixed yet. Kpler data cited in trade coverage shows crude flows through Hormuz have recovered to roughly 76% of pre-war levels, but refined-product shipments are still running around just 11% of normal — because Gulf refinery runs remain down near 7.3 million b/d versus 9.9 million b/d before the war, a shortfall traders don't expect to fully close before 2027. FreightWaves

The Chatter

Rory Johnston (Commodity Context, Substack): argues the White House's lurch from threatening a domestic diesel export ban to cutting a sanctions-relief deal with Putin for Russian barrels is a sign of genuine political desperation over fuel prices heading into the midterms, not a coherent fix for what is fundamentally a refining-capacity problem. Commodity Context

Rory Johnston (X): flags that prompt Brent futures pushing above $116/bbl is a level exceeded on only a handful of days all year, and separately notes Chinese crude imports are set to hit their highest since buyers pulled back early in the Iran war — both landing suspiciously close to the US midterm elections, numbers he suggests are worth reading through a political lens as much as a supply one. X · X