Brent crude futures rose 3.4 per cent to $97.10 a barrel on Thursday's ICE close and WTI added 3.7 per cent to $91.55 on Nymex, the largest one-day gain in crude since the late-March mining of the Strait of Hormuz. The move reversed most of Wednesday's six-per-cent slide, with the rebound driven by President Donald Trump's "not satisfied" framing of the just-agreed sixty-day US-Iran memorandum of understanding.
The reaction split the global benchmark from the regional one. Brent rose more sharply than WTI in absolute terms but less in percentage, reflecting the European cargo market's heavier exposure to the Hormuz pinch. Murban, the Dubai-linked Middle Eastern benchmark, rose 4.1 per cent to $96.20 with the front-month Murban-Brent differential turning marginally negative for the first time in two weeks.
Physical signal was mixed. Tanker tracking firm Vortexa reported twenty-two VLCC transits of Hormuz on Wednesday, the highest single-day figure since early March and only six below the pre-war daily baseline, with most of the increase from Saudi Aramco and ADNOC cargoes destined for Asia. The recovery in Iranian and Iraqi flows has been slower, with insurance-market reluctance to underwrite Iranian-flagged cargoes still the binding constraint.
Refinery margins reversed Tuesday's rally. The Singapore complex margin fell back to $12.30 per barrel from $14.20 Tuesday, and the European gas-oil crack slipped to $37 a tonne. US Gulf Coast margins were the only major regional read to hold, supported by the seasonal start to driving demand. RBOB futures rose 2.6 per cent to $2.65 a gallon ahead of the long Memorial Day driving stretch.
Trader positioning continues to show net long but stretched. CFTC commitment-of-traders data through Tuesday showed money-manager longs in WTI at the eighty-fifth percentile of the past five-year range, against a backdrop of trimmed open interest. Goldman Sachs commodities desk said Thursday afternoon they were "neutral into the weekend" given the headline risk from Trump's public posture on the Iran framework.
The 2026 forward curve has flattened. The December 2026 to December 2027 Brent spread closed at a contango of seventy cents, against backwardation of one dollar ten cents a week ago, reflecting expectations of more Iranian and Iraqi supply coming back through the second half of the year. Goldman maintains its third-quarter Brent forecast at $92 a barrel; JPMorgan trimmed its third-quarter call to $90 on Thursday morning.