Why are oil prices surging above $104? Hormuz attacks and Hurricane Isaias raise supply fears

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Narrated by Charlotte · The Noble House

Brent crude had just reclaimed $104 a barrel on Thursday, October 8, 2026, climbing 4% as a record run of tanker attacks near the Strait of Hormuz collided with Hurricane Isaias heading for the US Gulf Coast [1][2]. The price level itself was not new; Brent had traded around $104 in mid-September and briefly spiked above $109 earlier that month [7][10]. Chevron's CEO has warned that depleted crude buffers could push prices higher in the coming months, which leaves the market exposed to further escalation [8].

What Happened on October 8

Financial Express reported that Brent spiked 4% to top $104 a barrel as shut-ins in the Gulf of Mexico and Middle East tensions tightened supply [2]. CNN's account put Brent up more than 5% at one point before it pulled back to trade 4.8% higher at $105 a barrel at 8:30 a.m. ET, with West Texas Intermediate at $92.48 [1]. ZeeBiz reported that Brent crossing $104 triggered selling in oil marketing companies, airlines and passenger vehicle stocks [6]. Reuters reported that oil rose on persistent worries about Middle East supply as tanker attacks in the Strait of Hormuz continued [4].

Two drivers appear in nearly every account. One is the shipping war around Hormuz. The other is Hurricane Isaias, which Reuters linked to disruption of Gulf of Mexico production [5]. Reuters also reported concerns that the US might renew strikes on Iran [5].

The $104 figure needs context. Brent ended the week of September 11 at $104.61 a barrel, according to a Zacks report on Chevron [8]. On Monday, September 14, Brent traded above $109 in the morning, hitting highs not seen since May after a 9% weekly gain, and settled at $105.68 [7]. Reuters put the intraday peak that morning at $109.29, a 16-week high [9]. By September 17, an Investing.com analysis described Brent as trading around $104 in recent sessions [10]. So the October 8 move is a return to a level the market had already visited, not a new record. It also sits below the mid-September peak.

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Illustration: Oil prices spiked to $105 a barrel on October 8 as Middle East tensions and Hurricane Isaias disrupted supply, triggering market volatility.

The Hormuz Shipping Shock

Investopedia describes the Strait of Hormuz as a key maritime shipping route, and says disruptions there, along with ongoing Middle East conflict, have fanned concerns of a supply shock that could spark inflation [3]. Reuters reported that before the US and Israel attacked Iran in late February, about a fifth of the world's oil supplies passed through the strait [9].

The attack data is the sharpest evidence of stress. According to Kpler, 10 tankers were struck in the strait between September 28 and October 4, well above the previous weekly high of six [1]. In the latest attack, on Wednesday, a tanker reported being struck by "multiple projectiles," causing casualties, according to the UK Maritime Trade Operations agency [1].

Traffic figures point the same way, with a caveat. Preliminary Kpler data showed just seven tankers transited the strait on Tuesday, less than half the seven-day average and the lowest number since July 23 [1]. CNN noted that such figures are at times revised higher because many ships switch off their identification systems to avoid detection [1]. CNN also reported that more crude has been flowing out of the Gulf even as attacks rise [1]. That is the tension ING's commodities strategists described: "a clear tug-of-war at the moment between improving supply from the region and lingering threats to supply." They added that "the only way to see prices trade sustainably lower is for lingering risks to be addressed" [1].

The strait's problems were visible in September too. Reuters reported that commodity vessel transits fell to a single digit per day at the weekend before September 14, well below a 10-day average of 14, and that Iran issued a list of 77 ships it said had violated its protocols for operating in Hormuz [9].

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Illustration: Tankers navigate the Strait of Hormuz as shipping disruptions and Middle East tensions tighten global oil supply.

The Gulf Storm and the Refining Hub

The second shock is weather. Financial Express tied its 4% spike to Gulf of Mexico shut-ins [2]. Reuters reported that the storm was disrupting production [5].

The reports do not quantify how many barrels the storm has removed. The sources describe shut-ins, curtailments and fear of further losses, but none states a volume. That limits what can be said. The storm is confirmed as a live source of supply risk, and the evidence does not support calling it the dominant one.

The location matters for products as well as crude. CNN described the storm as heading toward America's refining hub on the Gulf Coast, where Shell and Chevron said they would curtail production and evacuate nonessential personnel [1].

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Illustration: Hurricane Isaias disrupts production at a Gulf Coast refining hub, contributing to higher oil prices alongside tensions in the Strait of Hormuz.

Thin Buffers: The Saudi Pipeline and Inventories

A third factor sits behind both shocks: the system has little slack. Mike Wirth, Chevron's CEO, said at an energy conference on September 11 that depleted global crude oil buffers could push oil prices higher in the coming months [8].

The Saudi pipeline episode shows how the buffers have eroded. On Friday, September 11, an attack, which Riyadh blamed on Iran-backed fighters in Iraq, knocked out Saudi Arabia's east-west pipeline [9]. That pipeline helps the kingdom avoid Hormuz by rerouting oil shipments to the Red Sea, and its loss threatened up to 4% of global oil supply [9]. With the pipeline out, the Red Sea port of Yanbu would have to draw on storage estimated to cover five to seven days of exports, according to three industry sources cited by Reuters [9]. Janiv Shah, an oil markets analyst at Rystad, said the relatively contained price reaction suggested the market expected Saudi inventories to cushion exports in the near term, but that the picture "could change quickly" if the disruption extended beyond that cushion [9]. John Evans of PVM pointed to Russian refinery outages and falling stockpiles when asking where "an inoculation against $120 Brent" could be found [9]. Investing.com likewise reported that Saudi Arabia had temporarily shut the pipeline after a drone attack [10].

Official stocks are the remaining cushion. The International Energy Agency said on Wednesday that member governments would not add to the 400 million barrels they agreed to release in March [1]. Roughly 325 million barrels have been released, with about 100 million still to come, and the agency pledged to "accelerate" those releases [1]. The IEA said members still hold public emergency stocks equivalent to around 1.1 billion barrels, including over 200 million barrels of diesel, and that it "stands ready to release more of these stocks to the market if and when required" [1]. CNN reported that European diesel futures closed 6% higher on Wednesday after the agency's decision not to add to the March release [1].

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Illustration: Depleted global crude oil buffers leave markets vulnerable to supply shocks, as illustrated by the vast but strained infrastructure of an oil storage terminal.

Fuel Prices, Equities and Inflation

The effects are already showing outside the oil futures pit. CNN reported that rising oil prices came with higher European natural gas and diesel prices, fanning inflation fears and contributing to a renewed selloff in European bonds, given the continent's reliance on imported energy [1]. AAA data showed average US diesel at $6.28 a gallon and regular gasoline at $4.36 on Thursday [1]. In September, CNBC reported that gasoline had hit a Labor Day record and that US diesel had reached a record high above $6 per gallon [7].

Heavy-oil spillovers have reached consumer goods. CNBC reported that Costco limited member purchases of motor oil to two units per week and raised the price of one product to $57.99 from a typical range near $30. Refiners were favoring diesel and gasoline over the base oil used in synthetic motor oil [7].

Markets have registered the strain. In India, ZeeBiz reported selling in oil marketing companies, airlines and passenger vehicle stocks as Brent crossed $104 [6].

Investing.com's overview sets out the transmission logic with hedges. A disruption does not necessarily remove the affected supply from the market immediately, but transportation difficulties can raise shipping costs, affect delivery times and reduce supply flexibility, which may contribute to a higher risk premium [10]. It adds that the effect on inflation depends on the size and duration of the price move, exchange rates, government policy and the broader economy [10]. It also notes that a prolonged shock raises stagflation concerns, in which inflation stays elevated while growth weakens [10].

Analysis: Reading the Move

The verified events above support a clear structure, though the causal weighting is analysis, not reported fact.

Analysis: two shocks met a thin market. The Hormuz attacks and the Gulf storm hit at once, which fits the framing that dual supply-side shocks lifted prices. The attack counts, the curtailments and the same-day price jump are verified. The claim that these two together explain the surge is an inference from converging reports, not a finding any single source states. Wirth's remark on depleted buffers [8], the Saudi pipeline's short storage cover [9] and the IEA's refusal to add to its March release [1] all suggest that a given disruption now moves prices more than it would with fuller stocks.

Analysis: the price pattern argues for risk pricing over lost barrels. Brent was around $104 to $105 in mid-September [7][8][10] and is there again now [1][2], after a spike to $109.29 in between [9]. A market that was physically running out of crude would be unlikely to hold a band like this. The pattern fits a market that reprices each headline while physical flows are impaired but not collapsed. CNN's observation that more crude has been flowing out of the Gulf even as attacks rise points in that direction [1]. The dark-transit caveat means the true flow data is uncertain, and the sources do not settle it [1].

Analysis: the 4% jump looks like a risk-premium event. A single-day move of this size, coinciding with a storm warning and a record attack count, reflects traders adding premium for what could go wrong. It does not by itself measure barrels lost. The sources document fear and curtailments, and they do not report a measured national or global supply shortfall from either shock.

Analysis: the pressure points differ in duration. A hurricane shut-in is typically brief compared with a conflict. That reading follows from the nature of the two threats and is not drawn from the reporting. The Hormuz conflict has persisted through the sources' entire timeline, from the late-February attacks on Iran [9] to the record attack week at the start of October [1]. ING's point that sustainably lower prices require lingering risks to be addressed [1] suggests the storm can add a spike, but only the shipping war sets the floor.

Judgment

The best-supported reading is that the Hormuz shipping war is the main reason oil sits above $104, since Brent held that level in mid-September, before Isaias [7][10]. Record tanker attacks, a seven-tanker transit count and a long-running conflict all feed a market that Chevron's chief executive says has little inventory slack [1][8][9].

The more telling signal is that $104 is not a peak. Brent was higher in mid-September [7][9], and the market has since held a high band instead of climbing. That favors a premium-driven market in which prices stay elevated while the shipping risks stand, and fall back only if those risks recede, as ING put it [1]. A weaker hurricane would likely take only the day's spike out of the price, and a quiet Hormuz would take out far more.

The practical call is that the storm's effect should fade faster than the strait's. Reading the $104 as only a storm story misses that Brent held that level in mid-September, before Isaias [7][10]. The durable story is how thin the cushion has become: roughly 100 million barrels of IEA releases still to come [1], a Saudi bypass pipeline that was knocked out in September [9], and a Chevron chief executive warning that buffers are depleted [8]. The IEA says members still hold about 1.1 billion barrels of emergency stocks and stands ready to release more [1], so if the attacks continue, the size of any further release will matter as much as the attacks themselves.

Why are oil prices surging above $104? Hormuz attacks and Hurricane Isaias raise supply fears

What Happened on October 8

The Hormuz Shipping Shock