Strait of Hormuz
AIS observation, distinct from the structural share above. Meaning comes from the gap between the two.
Indicative delayed market price: a tension gauge, distinct from the physical flow. A rise signals the input tightening.
The most exposed chokepoint on the planet: a fifth of the world's oil and LNG passes through a channel a few kilometres wide. No real workaround for Gulf exports.
In 2024, ~20 million barrels/day transited the Strait of Hormuz, about 20% of global petroleum liquids consumption and more than a quarter of seaborne oil trade; no reliable forward projection, a structural chokepoint.U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2025 ↗
The bottleneck without a substitute
Hormuz is the chokepoint where the gap between the flow and its escape route is largest. About 20 million barrels a day transit it; the only existing land bypasses, Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline (Petroline) and the UAE's Habshan-Fujairah link, together cap out around 3 million barrels a day, and are already partly in use. In case of closure, more than 85 % of the flow would have no physical backup route.
Geography leaves no way out: two shipping lanes about three kilometers wide each, separated by a buffer zone, running along Iranian and Omani territorial waters. One does not bypass Hormuz: one uses it, or one does not leave the Gulf.
The threat as a rent
Iran periodically brandishes closure of the strait, again in June 2025, after the American and Israeli strikes on its territory, when its Parliament floated a blockade. But the weapon lies in the threat: closing Hormuz would strangle Iran's own exports and hurt China, the leading buyer of Tehran's crude. The lever works through deterrence.
The real effect is read in the risk premiums and marine-insurance surcharges, which jump at each escalation without a single cargo being interrupted. Hormuz produces geopolitical value by staying open and threatening at once: a permanent surcharge on the global oil market.