Photo: Martin Holverda / iStock / Getty Images
As the week gets underway, oil and natural gas traders, producers and refiners are concerned that oil flows from the Middle East are still stifled because the Strait of Hormuz is closed.
It's been effectively closed for six weeks because Iran has been threatening shipping that normally moves through the international trade route, but President Donald Trump, who's been promising for weeks to reopen the waterway, is now publicly planning to set up what he calls a "blockade" of the Strait.
The US Central Command, which directs US military operations in the Middle East, said on Sunday that the blockade will begin at 9 am Monday Central Daylight Time.
Oil, gas and gasoline markets appeared slightly skeptical of the Trump administration's planned move, with market prices leaping upward about eight-percent at the opening of international markets in Asia on Sunday night US time (Monday morning in Asia).
West Texas Intermediate crude oil was up more than 8 points at the open, or about 8-perent, at $104 a barrel, International standard Brent crude was up 7-percent at about $102 a barrel.
1 of 1