Good afternoon, this is Markets Desk with your midday briefing.
The single most consequential story in global energy markets right now is the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian authorities are flatly contradicting White House claims of a reopening, with the Persian Strait Gulf Authority stating the waterway remains blocked until Tehran's conditions are met. Traffic through the strait has fallen to near three-month lows, a chokepoint that handles roughly a fifth of the world's seaborne oil supply.
That's compounding an already stressed crude picture. Oil prices are moving higher on a separate but related front, as deadly attacks on vessels in the Gulf of Oman and the Red Sea continue to rattle shipping lanes. An active oil spill near Oman is worsening by the hour, adding a physical supply disruption on top of the geopolitical premium already baked into prices.
Pulling the lens back to the communications world, Karoline Leavitt's departure from the White House press secretary role is drawing attention not just for the resignation itself, but because her farewell post on X was labeled as made with artificial intelligence by the platform. It's reigniting the debate over AI watermarking and what it means when public figures either use or deny using generative tools in official communications.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
