{"id":440387,"date":"2026-10-20T01:40:24","date_gmt":"2026-10-19T18:40:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/market-news\/oil-reverses-course-higher-after-us-and-houthi-attacks-440387\/"},"modified":"2026-10-20T01:40:24","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T18:40:24","slug":"oil-reverses-course-higher-after-us-and-houthi-attacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/market-news\/oil-reverses-course-higher-after-us-and-houthi-attacks-440387\/","title":{"rendered":"Oil reverses course higher after US and Houthi attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Oil prices have reversed higher in light of fresh reports about two separate Middle East strikes. WTI had traded down to $99.24 earlier and brent to $106.82, both after the US waived santions on Russian fuel.<\/p>\n

That move now seems to have bought about 15 hours of lower oil prices and now crude is up on the day, with WTI at $103.13 and brent just above $110.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Two stories have driven the gains, the first is that the Iranian navy said the US attacked the Konarek naval base with “two light projectiles” early this morning and that wo solidiers were injured.\u00a0<\/p>\n

More recently, a pair of reports highlight that Houthis claimed six attacks on Saudi Arabia in the past 48 hours, including strikes on the Yanbu oil facility owned by Aramco, the Shaybah oilfield and airports in Ryiadh and Abha. Today, Saudi Arabia cancelled this year’s ‘Davos in the Desert’ conference.<\/p>\n

The next quesion is what will be the retaliation for the latest strikes on both sides. The US hadn’t attacked Iran in seven weeks; Trump also said no attacks before the midterms. This one was characterized as small so perhaps it’s ignored as Iran continues to focus on striking ships transiting Hormuz.\u00a0<\/p>\n

WTI crude oil daily:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Looking at the chart, oil has been climbing steadily higher in the past two weeks and is now within striking distance of the Sept 14 high of $104.95. We’re getting very close to the point where a drop is too late to help Trump in the midterms so negotiations will be fruitless, despite a Qatari report today about new proposals.<\/p>\n

Beyond the midterms, the calculus likely points to escalation, though at that point Republicans and Democrats may wish to sharpen their anti-war chops ahead of the 2028 election cycle. If Republicans suffer a rough defeat in the midterms, Congress could add pressure on Trump to exit Iran and find a way to make a deal. Alternatively, the US administration may simply conclude that the blockade on Iran and periodic strikes on shipping is a long-term strategy that will win.<\/p>\n

What’s more-concerning than the near-term chart is that if you look further out on the curve. October 2027 oil prices are at $83 and that’s up $13 since the start of September and above the pre-war peak. That’s the market doubting the endless promises from Trump that oil prices will “come crashing down”.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

This article was written by Adam Button at investinglive.com.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oil prices have reversed higher in light of fresh reports about two separate Middle East strikes. WTI had traded down to $99.24 earlier and brent to $106.82, both after the US waived…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":216,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[86],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-440387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-market-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/216"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440387\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swingfish.trade\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}