Good morning, you're tuned in to Markets Desk.
Crude oil is trading higher this session after reports emerged that two Abu Dhabi vessels were attacked by Iranian forces in the Strait of Hormuz overnight. September West Texas Intermediate is up roughly three quarters of a percent, with RBOB gasoline gaining just over one percent. Hormuz tensions historically inject a risk premium into energy markets fast, and traders are watching the strait closely.
Shifting to commodities, cocoa futures are finding modest support today as the dollar index slips three tenths of a percent. A weaker dollar broadly lifts dollar-denominated commodities, and September ICE New York cocoa is up nearly two percent on the session. That said, prices remain in consolidation territory, so this looks more like a technical breather than a directional breakout.
On the pharmaceutical policy front, new research is challenging one of the core promises of the Inflation Reduction Act. Lawmakers projected Medicare drug price negotiations would save taxpayers more than one hundred billion dollars over a decade, but the analysis suggests the price controls could actually distort incentives enough to push costs higher in the long run, raising serious questions about how the policy plays out structurally.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
