Two Hormuz tankers hit, yet Brent slips 0.8%

Two supertankers carrying a combined more than 4 million barrels of oil were stopped by a "massive explosion" in the southern part of the Strait of Hormuz late on Wednesday, Iran's Revolutionary Guards Navy said in a statement reported by Anadolu Agency. The Guards said the ships used an "unauthorized" route despite warnings and did not name them.

Iran's army said the two tankers struck naval mines, Newsquawk reported, citing ISNA. The claim has not been independently confirmed; the US military recently said all mines had been cleared from the strait, Euronews reported.

How the market reacted

Oil fell rather than rose. Brent for January was down $0.72 at $92.04 a barrel and WTI down $0.77 at $85.76 on Thursday morning, after both dropped more than $1 in early Asian trading, Cornerstone Futures said. The firm tied the weekly loss to rising OPEC+ output and noted tanker freight rates had fallen about 50% from last month's peaks, according to Baltic Exchange data.

A day earlier, Brent had edged up 0.2% to $91.71 after hitting a two-month low, as continued attacks on shipping tempered hopes of de-escalation, Euronews reported.

Flows: before the war and now

Traffic through the strait has averaged 10.5 million barrels a day since the start of October, below the pre-war average of 13.5 million, while total Gulf crude exports including bypass routes reached 16.7 million, just short of 17 million before the war, according to Kpler data cited in a Reuters column by Ron Bousso. Tanker Trackers put Hormuz flows at 13.1 million barrels a day in the week to November 5, still below pre-war levels, PolitiFact reported.