Oil continued its recent surge on Sunday, hitting $100 per barrel for the first time since July 2022, as the ripple effects of the US war on Iran continued to hit global markets.
In addition to oil’s rise, S&P 500 futures fell 1.5%, Dow futures fell 900 points and Nasdaq 100 futures fell 1.2%, suggesting US stocks are poised to continue last week’s decline.
Oil rebounded after a record 35% jump last week. Along with rising oil prices, US retail gas prices also rose to a national average of $3.450 per gallon.
Oil and gas prices last rose to this level since the Russian invasion of Ukraine that began in February 2022.
The war continues to batter oil infrastructure and push refineries to cut production. Kuwait’s state oil company said it was trimming production, while the state-run oil company of the United Arab Emirates said it was “maintaining” some output, hinting at possible production cuts.
The Strait of Hormuz, off southern Iran, is essentially impossible for most oil and liquefied natural gas tankers trying to reach global markets.
Consumers are already starting to see increased prices at their local gas stations, and at least one analyst predicts prices could rise further. “I now estimate an 80% chance that the national average will reach $4/gal in the next month,” said GasBuddy analyst Patrick de Haan at X.
This year, US crude oil prices have soared more than 80% as the Trump administration ramped up its rhetoric against the Iranian regime, before striking the country and killing Iran’s supreme leader.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly dismissed concerns about rising oil and gas prices since the war began, telling Reuters on Friday, “I’m not concerned about that at all,” adding that prices “will go down very quickly after this is over, and if they go up, they’ll go up, but that’s more important than gasoline prices going up a little bit.”
On Sunday, Trump said on social media that spiking prices were “a very small price to pay for the safety and peace of the USA and the world.”
