June 17, 2026 Commercial ships and oil tankers continue to wait in the Gulf of Oman as they prepare to transit the Strait of Hormuz, one of the most important strategic waterways for global trade flows.
Shade Arasa | Anadolu | Getty Images
Oil prices fell on Tuesday, reversing modest gains at the start of trading, as investors expressed cautious optimism about an end to the Middle East conflict.
international benchmark brent crude oil August futures fell 1.57% to $76.68 per barrel. us West Texas Intermediate Futures In August, it fell 1.53% to $72.73 per barrel.
brent crude oil
Prices for the commodity fell overnight after the U.S. Treasury issued a 60-day permit allowing the production, delivery and sale of Iranian crude oil. This will make it possible to import Iranian crude oil into the United States and pay for the crude oil in dollars. The license expires on August 21st.
However, there were also concerns that Iran would use profits from oil sales to rebuild its military. President Donald Trump was asked Monday if he could prevent such a scenario from happening.
“They’re not going to do that, so let’s wait and see,” Trump said during an executive order signing event at the White House. “They should be spending money to buy food for the people, because right now the people are very hungry and they are only buying corn and soybeans from us,” he added.
Despite Iran declaring a closure of the Strait of Hormuz over the weekend, Vice President Vance said “significant progress” had been made in talks in Switzerland. U.S. Central Command said Hormuz is not closed.
Recent developments appear to be increasing investor optimism that there may be a lasting solution.
“If you follow the trading patterns in oil prices over the last few weeks, you can see that the market is becoming increasingly confident that we are nearing an end to the conflict,” Scott Kronert, managing director of U.S. equity strategy at Citi Research, said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia.”
“This energy price overshoot with its inflationary overtones should subside in the coming weeks and months,” he added.
—CNBC’s Dan Mangan and Spencer Kimball contributed to this report.
