Oil prices jump, US markets retreat as Iran war exacerbates supply concerns – National
Markets on Wall Street retreated and oil prices jumped another five percent early Thursday as the war with Iran entered its second week with no signs that the United States and Israel were ready to back off their attacks.
S&P 500 futures lost 0.5 percent before the opening bell, while Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were down 0.6 percent. Nasdaq futures were also down 0.5 percent. On Wednesday, the Dow fell 0.6 percent to its lowest level in a year.
Oil prices initially rose more than nine percent as supply concerns were exacerbated by Iran’s attacks on commercial vessels around the Strait of Hormuz. The American campaign of airstrikes in Iran is in its 13th day.
Benchmark US crude oil jumped US$4.52 to US$91.77 a barrel. Brent, the international benchmark, rose $5.34 to $97.32 a barrel after briefly eclipsing the US$100 level.
Iran has stepped up its attacks aimed at causing enough global economic pain to pressure the United States and Israel to end the war, targeting oil fields and refineries in several Gulf Arab states. Iran’s actions have effectively halted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of all oil traded passes.
In response, the International Energy Agency agreed on Wednesday to release 400 million barrels of oil, the largest volume of emergency oil reserves in its history, in an effort to combat the effects of a war on energy markets. The US plans to withdraw 172 million barrels of oil next week from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve to combat rising prices.
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The IEA’s announcement came a day after energy ministers from the Group of Seven – leading industrial nations Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan, Germany and Britain – met in Paris to look at ways to lower prices.
But the ongoing conflict and uncertainty have fueled speculation prices may rise, and that has depressed markets around the world.
In a report, Oxford Economics said that “the volatility of Brent crude oil prices over the past few days is eye-catching and the likelihood that they will change will remain due to the absence of a timeline for when the conflict will subside and when the Strait of Hormuz, successfully closed, will see traffic begin to recover.”
The level of volatility suggests that depending on news developments, oil prices could rise to US$140 per barrel, Oxford analysts said.
Since the start of the war, sharp movements in oil prices have caused financial markets around the world to fluctuate, sometimes on an hourly basis. Oil prices rose briefly to their highest levels since 2022 this week on the possibility that production in the Middle East could be curbed for a long time, which also raised concerns about rising inflation that is eroding the global economy.
In Europe at midday, Germany’s DAX and Britain’s FTSE 100 were both unchanged, while the CAC 40 in Paris lost 0.4 percent.
During Asian trading, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 fell 1 percent to 54,452.96. In South Korea, the Kospi lost 0.5 percent to 5,583.25, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng shed 0.7 percent to 25,716.76.
The Shanghai Composite index fell 0.1% to 4,129.10 and in Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 1.3% to 8,629.00.
In early trading Thursday, the dollar fell to 158.62 Japanese yen from 158.95 yen. The euro fell to US$1.1563 from US$1.1566.
© 2026 The Canadian Press
