Oil prices steady as Iran talks loom, monthly losses deepen

Oil prices were little changed Tuesday, but the month-end damage was severe: Brent crude settled down 23 cents at $72.92 a barrel and West Texas Intermediate fell $1.25 to $69.50, with both benchmarks set for their steepest monthly and quarterly losses since the early 2020 pandemic shock. Brent’s August contract expired Tuesday, and the September contract traded near $73.31.

In Doha, U.S. envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff arrived as technical discussions with Iranian counterparts were expected to continue through mediators rather than in a direct high-level meeting. Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesperson Majed Al-Ansari said the talks would center on regional issues as well as Iran, and the June 17 interim accord gave the sides 60 days to negotiate a permanent truce. Weekend exchanges of fire had tested that arrangement. Roughly 20% of global oil supplies flowed through the Strait of Hormuz before the war.

Ships stranded during the fighting were becoming available again as vessels moved out of the Gulf, UBS analyst Giovanni Staunovo said. Morgan Stanley modeled an implied global oil market surplus of 4.8 million barrels per day in 2027 and cut its Brent forecast to $75 a barrel for the first half of that year and $70 in the second half. J.P. Morgan Global Research projected world oil demand growth of 0.9 million barrels per day in 2026.

Refiners, fuel distributors and gas stations tend to pass through cheaper crude only after they have sold through older, higher-cost inventories, so drivers often feel the benefit weeks later, not immediately. The EIA warned OECD inventories could fall to 50 days of future demand cover by the end of 2026, while OPEC forecast about 1.7 million barrels a day of demand growth in 2027.