Oil prices drop 5% after Trump says Iran talks are moving ahead but Hormuz still a wildcard

Oil prices dropped Monday after President Trump said negotiations with Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz were moving ahead — though traders remained braced for more potential chaos as the blockade that has choked global energy supplies drags on.Both international benchmark Brent crude and US benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude had fallen about 5% as of 9:45 a.m.ET — to $98 a barrel and $92 per barrel, respectively — after Trump voiced progress on talks with Iran.“The negotiations are proceeding in an orderly and constructive manner,” he wrote Sunday on social media, while cautioning that the US would “not rush into a deal.”Monday’s selloff extended losses from last week, when WTI dropped more than 8% and Brent fell more than 5% after Trump said he halted imminent airstrikes on Iran to give diplomacy more time.Still, despite Monday’s decline, crude remains dramatically elevated from prewar levels after surging more than 30% since the US and Israel launched strikes against Iran in late February.Scott Martin, a partner at Kingsview Wealth Management, told The Post that investors may be prematurely pricing in a resolution to the Iran crisis even as major risks remain unresolved.“I think the market may be getting a little ahead of itself here,” he said.

“Every positive headline around Iran talks seems to knock oil lower, but the actual supply situation still looks pretty tight.“A lot of traders are acting like this thing is almost resolved already, and I don’t think we’re there yet,” he added.“You still have production offline and the Strait of Hormuz is still a real wildcard.”The latest rout was driven by mounting hopes that Washington and Tehran could eventually hammer out a framework to reopen Hormuz — the narrow waterway that handles roughly 20% of the world’s oil supply, which has become the epicenter of the largest energy shock in modern history.Iran has maintained a de-facto blockade of the strait since early March, ...