(Reuters) – Goldman Sachs on Tuesday flagged both upside and downside risks to its average 2026 crude forecasts for Brent/WTI at $83/78 per barrel, citing growing uncertainty around Middle East developments and oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz.
- Reduced flows through Hormuz pose the biggest upside risk to Goldman’s price forecasts, with estimated oil flows through the strait still at 10% of normal or 2.1 million barrels per day (bpd), they said.
- The United States Navy on Monday had begun a blockade on vessels entering or leaving Iranian ports and coastal areas, posing further upside risk to prices as Iran-associated tankers have been accounting for most recent flows through the strait.
- Meanwhile, cuts to oil production in the Middle East were lower than Goldman’s mid-March estimates, skewing prices to the downside.
- The bank estimates 8 million bpd of average crude production shut-ins in the Persian Gulf in March, roughly in line with OPEC Secondary Sources but lower than IEA estimates of 10 million bpd.
- The announcement of a U.S.-Iran ceasefire and rising prospects of a near-term peace deal have added further downward pressure on prices by easing the geopolitical risk premium.
- The bank said that global visible oil inventories are drawing down at a markedly slower pace, with estimated draws easing to around 2 million bpd over the past week from roughly 7 million bpd on a month-to-date basis.
- This slowdown may reflect that a growing share of inventory draws are occurring in landed product stocks across non-OECD Asia, or that demand losses may be accelerating.
- Goldman estimates that naphtha demand in April is likely to decrease by roughly 1.3 million bpd compared to February levels, while jet fuel demand is likely 0.5 million bpd below its trend.
- Brent crude futures were steady at $94.75 a barrel at 0701 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was down 0.3% to $90.98 per barrel.
Reporting by Pablo Sinha in Bengaluru; Editing by Janane Venkatraman
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