停火本应开放霍尔木兹海峡 但航运仍受阻

The ceasefire announcement has not yetliftedoil flowsthrough the Strait of Hormuz but a quick normalization islargely in the price, in our view. A potential delay or furtherescalation poses upside risks to our $85/b Brent forecast for2026. Commodities Research Amarpreet Singh+1 212 526 1672amarpreet.x.singh@barclays.comBCI, US •A fragile ceasefire is a welcome news but tanker transits through the Strait of Hormuz remainmuted so far. A relatively quick normalization oftrafficthrough the Strait of Hormuz is largelyin the price, in our view, and a potential delay or a further escalation poses upside risks to ourprice forecast. •Demand has notsufficientlyadjusted to cap prices at current levels if the Strait situationpersists for a few more weeks. Adjusted for the transmission lag, supply disruption is beinglargely reflected in the inventory data. In addition, given stronger-than-expected spotfundamentals going into the conflict, there issufficientroom for some demand compressionin our baseline scenario. While the ceasefire announcement has been welcome news, less than 48 hours in, there hasalready beennewsflow about the little progress so far on the sticky issues such as the fate of theStrait, highly enriched uranium stockpile, scope of the ceasefire itself and whether Iran canenrich uranium domestically.1 With a further escalation seeminglyoffthe table, at least for now, and the participants seriouslytalking is a positive sign that has provided some relief. Key oil benchmark prices were down10-15% on the day but under the surface there were signs of skepticism. For example, the prompt-month Brent 25-delta put-call skew normalized for 50-delta vol wentfurther negative yesterday, suggesting market participants saw even greater asymmetry in thepath for oil prices ahead. By comparison, at the end of the 12-day war in June last year, thesame metric quickly went back to parity, signaling more balanced risk-reward. We tend to agree with that view. A relatively quick normalization in flows through the Strait ofHormuz would be consistent with our baseline scenario, in which we see Brent averaging $85/bin 2026. We expect Brent to average $80/b in Q4 26 in that scenario, and December 2026 Brent at$81/b at the time of writing suggests markets are likely priced for that outcome. Therefore, apotential delay in the normalization of the strait or a further escalationwould pose upside risksto oil prices from current levels. Flows through the Strait of Hormuz have remained muted (Figure 1) despite the ceasefireannouncement and, as highlighted in the recent chart book, there is evidence by now in supportof our estimate of the scale of supply disruption to be about 13-14 mb/d. There has been somepushback however, as some market participants have been pointing to the inventory data to Please see analyst certifications and important disclosures beginning on page 4. suggest that demand might have already adjusted enough to keep a lid on prices from here. Wedo not think so. Exports through the Strait of Hormuz end up primarily in Asia and the transmission takes abouttwo to three weeks on average. Therefore, onshore inventory changes are likely lagged by thatmuch and when we adjust our weekly global total oil inventory indicator for that lag, we findthat, adjusted for pre-pandemic seasonality, the rate of change in inventories, adjusted for thebeta with our estimated imbalance, is largely in line with the estimated disruption. There are other datapoints in support of the resilience in demand: 1) Notwithstanding thevolatility in weekly implied demand estimates from the EIA, there is no evidence of anyslowdown in demand yet in the US (Figure 2); 2) Demand in China has apparently comeoffbyaround 700 kb/d in March (adjusted for pre-pandemic seasonality) but that barelyoffsetstheupside surprise relative to our forecast in January and February (Figure 3); and 3) Indian oildemand growth remained very strong in March with all product categories, barring LPG, largelymaintaining the recent momentum (Figure 4). The flip side to that would be that alternative data such as credit card spend suggests USgasoline demand could be falling faster than implied by the historical sensitivity to higher pricesand Asian oil demand is unlikely to remain resilient if flows through the strait remain disruptedfor a few more weeks. Our counterargument would be that global inventory estimates balanceswere likely running 1-2 mb/d tighter than expected going into the conflict, leaving more thansufficientroom for some demand compression in our baseline scenario, based on the historicalsensitivity to prices. Therefore, barring the scenario of a broader slowdown in demand, wemaintain our $85/b view for Brent this year and still see risks to prices skewed higher. Barclays | Energy Sigma Analyst(s) Certification(s):I, Amarpreet Singh, hereby certify (1) that the views expressed in this research report accurately reflect my personal views about any or all