Oil Tops $100 For First Time Since July As US Destroys Five Iranian Tankers
Oil prices topped $100 per barrel Wednesday for the first time since July after American forces destroyed five Iranian tankers.
Brent crude rose 2.7% to $100.57 a barrel Wednesday morning, and last crossed $100 on July 24, according to ABC News. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) rose 2% to about $95 a barrel.
The national average price of regular gasoline rose to $4.22 a gallon Wednesday from $2.98 two days before the Iran war began Feb. 28, according to American Automobile Association (AAA) data.
U.S. Central Command said its forces destroyed four Iranian crude carriers in the Gulf of Oman and a fifth near Kharg Island on Tuesday after Iran fired ballistic missiles at a U.S. Navy warship twice in two days. The command said Wednesday that U.S. forces destroyed 10 Iranian tankers in the past week. The vessels were part of a “multibillion-dollar shadow network” that funds the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said.
Iran fired 20 ballistic missiles toward Jordan overnight, the Jordan Armed Forces said Wednesday. Jordanian air defenses destroyed 18 of them and two fell in unpopulated areas. The military recorded no casualties.
Iranian state-aligned media claimed the IRGC struck two U.S. Navy destroyers. CENTCOM, in a Wednesday morning X post, called the claim “completely FALSE” and said no U.S. warship has been hit.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry said Wednesday that its strikes on U.S. targets in Jordan were “defensive” and called the tanker attacks “a dangerous escalation of tensions in the region,” according to ABC News.
Iran-backed Houthi rebels attacked southwestern Saudi Arabia early Tuesday, wounding at least 73 people and striking oil infrastructure, according to CNN. Saudi Arabia has routed most of its crude exports through the Red Sea port of Yanbu since Iran effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz, CNN reported.
Ship traffic through the strait has fallen to its lowest level since May, according to Fox News. Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, the country’s top negotiator, wrote on X Monday that American oil and gas facilities in the region are “sprawling, accessible, and exposed,” Reuters reported.
Iran raised the gasoline price for its heaviest users Tuesday, its second such increase since December, according to The Associated Press. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News that China has “probably only about 30 million barrels” of Iranian crude left to buy.
The national average diesel price hit a record $5.94 a gallon Wednesday, according to AAA.
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