Oil prices jump 4% as Houthis fire missiles at Saudi Arabia

Oil prices jumped about 4% to a one-week high on Thursday after Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis fired missiles at Saudi Arabia and diplomatic talks between the ‌US and Iran showed little sign of progress.

Brent futures rose $4.10, or 4.0%, to $107.18 a barrel, while US West Texas Intermediate crude rose $3.66, or 4.0%, to $95.82. After climbing about 8% over the past two days, Brent futures were on track to close at their highest since September 15. 

WTI was on track to rise for the first time in seven days after falling about 13% over the prior six days. Saudi Arabia intercepted six ballistic missiles fired by the Houthis on Thursday, thwarting attacks on the southern province of Taif and Yanbu area on the Red Sea, the Saudi-led coalition in Yemen said.

Iranian flights to Gulf neighbors, including travel hub Dubai, appeared to have been canceled on Thursday after a US deadline passed for global firms to halt work with Iran’s airlines, a major step in a campaign US President Donald Trump calls “economic D-Day.”

With the US-Israeli war against Iran largely stalemated for months on the battlefield, Washington has announced a shift in tactics to extend the reach of its financial sanctions by targeting companies from third countries that do business with Iranian firms, a practice known as “secondary sanctions”.

Iran threatened on Wednesday to retaliate against any neighboring countries that comply with the US ban on its flights, by making their airports “unusable”.

Iran and the United States remain far apart on how to end their war but diplomacy must continue, a senior Iranian official told Reuters on Wednesday, after Iran’s president told the UN General Assembly that Tehran would never surrender to US pressure.

Separately, Saudi Arabia is building up crude pumping volumes through its East-West pipeline that runs to its Red Sea export hub of Yanbu, although ‌crude tanker loadings have yet to resume, according to industry sources, satellite imagery and shipping data.

With diesel prices hitting record highs in recent weeks, high-level contacts between the European Union and the United States are ongoing amid a reported US plan to ban diesel exports that the EU believes would potentially have a negative impact on both sides.

Politico reported that the US was preparing a 90-day ban on diesel exports amid a spike in prices ahead of the November midterm elections, though US Energy Secretary Chris Wright has disputed that.

Analysts and market watchers have warned a US diesel export ban would do little to ease high energy prices and could worsen global supplies and further disrupt economies. US diesel futures were trading up over 5% in late morning trade on Thursday.

The premium of Brent crude over WTI rose to its highest since May for a second day in a row on Thursday. A higher Brent premium over WTI means it is more economic for energy firms to send vessels to the US to pick up crude for export. 

But analysts noted the cost of chartering tankers has soared in recent months, resulting in a decline in US crude exports from record highs seen earlier this year.

Weekly US crude exports were just 3.3 million barrels per day during the week ended September 18, according to data from the US Energy Information Administration, down from a weekly record high of 6.4 million bpd in April when the cost to charter a ship was much lower.