Iran fires on tanker & container ship; Hormuz closed again

What do we know as to what's happening right now in the strait?

Yeah, interesting as well, listening to the president saying that he is not going to be held hostage by Iran. He did say that he thought things were going along well. I think everyone thought about five or six hours ago. Since then, the Iranians have appeared to attack two shipping vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. One tanker just off the coast of Oman, so very close to the Strait of Hormuz, said it was a said two IRGC Iranian gunboats came at it and didn't talk to it on the radio, literally opened fire on this tanker.

The crew and the vessel are reported safe. And then about two hours later in the same area an unidentified projectile hit a container ship. Some of the containers damaged, no fire, no environmental damage. But this comes just hours, just hours after the Iranians said they were reversing their opening of the Strait of Hormuz.

We've heard a lot of pushback from hardliners in Iran saying that that move essentially was too soft and that they are not responding well to the fact that President Trump said that the US blockade would remain in place. Iran accuses the United States here of not following through on its obligations on the ceasefire. So we've gone from a point of early this morning where things look like they were moving along well,

talks getting close, people talking about potential of talks here in Islamabad in a couple of days, Iranians upping the ante. And I think perhaps that gets to what the president said, he's not gonna be held hostage.

And he said he's expecting an update on the situation later today.

Nick, how much of this has to do with the situation in Lebanon with Israel, or are these

events concentrated based on concerns over the strait itself?

Absolutely, the Iranians opening the Strait of Hormuz was based on the fact that they saw President Trump and the Pakistani negotiators, the field marshal here, Mounir, get this ceasefire in Lebanon. That was a big part of moving things forward. But the Iranians, when they then did a quid pro quo and opened the Strait of Hormuz, because of course they wanted that ceasefire in Lebanon, they thought there would be a positive response

from the White House. That's what they're saying. What we've witnessed is a negative response in Iran to President Trump's response. We've even seen internal tensions in Iran between the hardliners and the moderates. The moderates are the ones who were in the negotiations. The hardliners have been saying that, had been threatening to reclose the Strait of Hormuz.

They've gone ahead and done that. Their gunboats appear to be attacking maritime vessels, tankers, container ships close to the Strait of Hormuz. So the two things are interlinked. But we're now back to the bigger issue here of U.S.-Iran tensions. Do we hear the talks or does this latest escalation of the Strait of Hormuz, does it scuttle all

of that?

The president said that we'll know more later today, and I imagine that will be the case. Nick Robertson in Islamabad, thank you for that report.

This latest escalation could mean big issues for oil and gas prices, so let's discuss now with Yahoo Finance correspondent Ben Worshko. Ben, good morning to you. Obviously, the impact, the consequence of these Iranian gunboats firing on a tanker go beyond that exchange.

It's the chilling, as Nick said, of any willingness of any of the other companies to send their vessels through. Fit this piece of the puzzle into what the shipping industry. And that's why I'm asking you to tell me how does the readiness of any of the other companies to send their vessels through fit this piece of the puzzle

into what has been clear as mud

over the last 24 hours about the straight of hormones? Yeah, I think chilling is the right is the right word here, and this is a chill that's been in evidence even even through all these ups and downs from the shipping industry, even with this announcement of an opening

of the Strait of Hormuz. These latest developments in the last hour will clearly amplify that further, but the shipping industry has been very wary, even as oil prices have come down, of increasing their shipping through. We've seen ships start to come through and then turn around. We've seen a few, as Nick mentioned, a cruise ship getting through, but that is more of the exception rather than the rule at this moment. Prior to the war,

it was over 130 ships that would pass through the Strait of Hormuz on a given day. Now, we're hoping for 20 on a given day, and we're not even there yet. So what I'm hearing a lot from the shipping industry is that this is going to be a long road I think that's going to be a big part of the recovery. I think the shipping industry is that this is going to be a long road back even in a best case scenario

here of a straight of a straight of harm is some sort of level of reopening. Obviously the last couple hours have made that even more difficult, but this is going to

be a long road back with hundreds and hundreds of ships the oil prices are going to go up. And I think that's something that we need to think about. And I think that when we look back up, they're not moving on rhetoric, right? They need some proof. They need some security. The oil prices

yesterday certainly moved on rhetoric. Brent crude down 9% around $90 or so a barrel. I wonder is the expectation that after what we saw today that the inverse is going to happen?

Could be, yeah. We will, the oil prices, we won't know sort of how the oil prices move for a little bit given the fact that it's the weekend. But the ships are simply not going to move until there's a lot more clarity on this. Another aspect of this that's important is that even this opening of the Strait of Hormuz from the Iranian side has been couched as towards the end of the ceasefire. That ceasefire is set to end on Wednesday and

even President Trump has talked in the last day about resuming bombing after that. So these shippers need a lot more certainty here about whether they can pass through, whether they can get the insurance to get through and kind of increase the oil flows that were that were to pre war levels that were a long, long ways from that. And even if even if we see a lot of good developments in last week, it's

going to be weeks and weeks after that before we kind of see markets fully stabilized on this. All right, Ben, let's

talk gas prices. The president

was in Nevada talking up the economy. By the way, $4.99 a gallon in Clark County. Nationally, the average this morning according to AAA is $4.06. Here's the president talking about the economy, his narrative on gas and the economy at large.

Well, they're not very high. If you look at what they were supposed to be in order to get rid of a nuclear weapon With the danger that entails in the report released last week Core inflation was down to the lowest level in five years and very shortly. We're gonna be probably eight or nine years Don't forget we're having some fake inflation because of the fuel the energy prices We had the best economy in the history of our country of my first term and we're blowing it out now

We're blowing it out now. We're blowing it away now. And despite our little diversion, despite our little diversion to the lovely country of Iran.

Yeah, and the president also saying that, you know, prices on gas are going to come falling down. The initial narrative from the White House was short-term pain for long-term gain. And now it sounds like it's shifted to what pain?

Yeah.

Yeah, and exactly. And I think that this price coming down of gas is going to be a long-term process here. There's an economics term called rockets and feathers, where prices at the pump shoot up like a rocket. I think everyone who's had to fill up their car

in the last months has seen that, that's a side, but then it comes down much more slowly, like a feather coming down. That's been a problem for presidents for years. And Biden felt it almost exactly four years ago with the invasion of Ukraine with high prices there. And I think we're going to be talking about that a lot all the way through the summer.

There's new projections from GasBuddy that talk about, you know, the prices now are over $4 a gallon, but even early estimates there of a best case scenario, and I think the developments this morning cast further doubt on that, only $350 a gallon gas by the end of the summer. That's months and months away, $3.80 as the summer begins. So this is going to be, the projections are, a very slow process down for gas prices if we're looking at the history here, and one that I think will be frustrating for the White

House hoping for this rapid fall, and I think frustrating for folks who are planning their summer travel as well. summer travel as well.

All right, Ben Worskow, thanks so much.