Crude oil surged toward its largest weekly advance in nearly six years on Friday, with Brent futures touching $87 a barrel as the escalating military conflict between the United States, Israel, and Iran throttled shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, the artery through which roughly a fifth of the world’s seaborne oil flows.
Brent crude climbed as much as 2.1 percent to $87.12 in London trading, extending a relentless five-session rally that has pushed the global benchmark up more than 19 percent since last Friday’s close of $72.87. West Texas Intermediate mirrored the move, rising above $82 a barrel for the first time since mid-2024.
If the gains hold through the session’s close, it will mark the steepest weekly percentage advance for oil since the Saudi Arabia–Russia production war rattled markets in the spring of 2020.
U.S. and Israeli forces launched coordinated strikes on Iran over the weekend, killing Supreme Leader Ali Hosseini Khamenei.
Tehran’s retaliatory missile barrages across Gulf states triggered an effective shutdown of tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, stranding an estimated 15 million barrels per day of crude and refined products at the chokepoint’s narrow entrance.
“The most immediate and tangible development affecting oil markets is the effective halt of traffic through the Strait of Hormuz,” said Jorge Leon, head of geopolitical analysis at Rystad Energy. The waterway, bordered on its northern edge by Iran, serves as the sole maritime exit for petroleum exports from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, the UAE, and Qatar.
The move in crude has been sweeping in scope. WTI posted its biggest single-session gain since May 2020 on Thursday, surging 8.51 percent to settle at $81.01 a barrel. Brent rose nearly 5 percent the same day to $85.41. Since the strikes began, U.S. oil has advanced roughly 21 percent, and retail gasoline prices at the pump have jumped nearly 27 cents to a national average of $3.25 per gallon, the sharpest weekly increase since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in March 2022, according to motorist group AAA.
President Donald Trump, speaking from the White House on Monday, signaled the conflict could prove protracted, saying the U.S. would continue executing large-scale strikes and that hostilities could last weeks. That assessment rattled energy markets afresh and sent Brent through the $82 level for the first time since January 2025.
