The Strait of Hormuz

On how much oil is getting through:

The Trump administration has been saying for a while that as many as nine million barrels of oil a day are traversing the Strait of Hormuz. That claim has been “fact checked” and derided by just about everyone. …

Only–oops–it turns out that President Trump and Secretary Wright, one of his cabinet’s most impressive members, were right all along, as Kpler now confirms:

“An average of 8.6 million barrels of oil a day have been flowing through the Strait of Hormuz — more than previously reported, maritime analyst firm Kpler confirmed in a new update that matches estimates from the Trump administration.
***
“Kpler and other trackers had initially put the number closer to 5 million, but new data includes “dark transits,” where ships turn off their transponders and secret ship-to-ship transfers, which the group wasn’t previously tracking.

“The nature of the transits left Kpler and other analysts to report only a handful of crossings every day, figures that were picked up by media outlets and used to point out the discrepancy between what was being reported and what the Trump administration was claiming.

“The White House has long-maintained that the data firms were missing a chunk of the exports due to the dark transits, with Kpler now confirming the fact as the dark ships start reappearing and painting a clearer picture of the oil flow.”

I seem to recall a considerable amount of discussion on this blog in the past about this topic.

Of the commenters here who pointed out the “transponders off” traffic, I think Turtler was the earliest in March of this year:

However, it seems like the strait is not really “closed” and that the main cost from it comes not from Iran or Iranian proxies and a proven ability to inflict significant damage on allied or neutral shipping, but from commercial costs and insurance speculation. Which Trump has responded to by offering to backfill insurance costs to keep things affordable. As it stands it seems like the strait isn’t physically closed and while traffic has dropped off, ships can and still do run the gauntlet relatively easily by just turning off their transponders during the period of maximum danger, and Iranian hit percentages and the damages inflicted when hit are worrying enough to not be trivial but not decisive (I’ll have to check to see if they’ve even managed to destroy a single tanker since)….

This is particularly worth noting and why I ask where you’re getting that from because the main way ships are transiting the strait is precisely BY turning off the Transponders during the crossing. Tracking transponders is the main way that most of the “Track how many ships are doing Y” sites or sources count such traffic.

The general pattern has been while you have a few ships transiting the strait with transponders on, but most turn them off and slip through, usually in clumps when they are gambling there are enough of them transiting that the Mullahs can’t hit or even detect all or most of them, or when there are friendly ships involved.

Turtler’s a smart guy who’s read a lot, but he does not have secret information and neither does anyone else who said the same things he did. He just had the patience to not accept at face value what he read, and look for facts that contradicted the narrative. And so he was way ahead of everybody.

That the Strait was never actually closed is one of the reasons oil stayed surprisingly low; another reason that the oil not getting through the Strait at one time is just waiting to show itself later, and the people buying futures know that and expect a glut when things return to normal.

Comments

The Strait of Hormuz — 4 Comments

Eeyore (Is, Eum) on September 2, 2026 at 1:49 pm said:

I still do not understand why we don’t just back the UAE’s long standing claim to the islands, and offer to give them transport and air support.
Niketas Choniates on September 2, 2026 at 1:49 pm said:

Of the commenters here who pointed out the “transponders off” traffic, I think Turtler was the earliest in March of this year:

However, it seems like the strait is not really “closed” and that the main cost from it comes not from Iran or Iranian proxies and a proven ability to inflict significant damage on allied or neutral shipping, but from commercial costs and insurance speculation. Which Trump has responded to by offering to backfill insurance costs to keep things affordable. As it stands it seems like the strait isn’t physically closed and while traffic has dropped off, ships can and still do run the gauntlet relatively easily by just turning off their transponders during the period of maximum danger, and Iranian hit percentages and the damages inflicted when hit are worrying enough to not be trivial but not decisive (I’ll have to check to see if they’ve even managed to destroy a single tanker since)….

This is particularly worth noting and why I ask where you’re getting that from because the main way ships are transiting the strait is precisely BY turning off the Transponders during the crossing. Tracking transponders is the main way that most of the “Track how many ships are doing Y” sites or sources count such traffic.

The general pattern has been while you have a few ships transiting the strait with transponders on, but most turn them off and slip through, usually in clumps when they are gambling there are enough of them transiting that the Mullahs can’t hit or even detect all or most of them, or when there are friendly ships involved.

Turtler’s a smart guy who’s read a lot, but he does not have secret information and neither does anyone else who said the same things he did. He just had the patience to not accept at face value what he read, and look for facts that contradicted the narrative. And so he was way ahead of everybody.

That the Strait was never actually closed is one of the reasons oil stayed surprisingly low; another reason that the oil not getting through the Strait at one time is just waiting to show itself later, and the people buying futures know that and expect a glut when things return to normal.
TommyJay on September 2, 2026 at 2:03 pm said:

I’m glad to hear that crude is getting through. But, global refinery capacity is as big, if not bigger, problem than the amount of crude oil. First capacity in Russia was lost, now Iran.
Road Warrior on September 2, 2026 at 2:10 pm said:

I was reliably assured that oil storage tanks would be empty by July 4.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2026-05-06/us-oil-storage-tanks-to-run-empty-around-july-4-currie-video

It is now early September and apparently that has not happened. It is true I pay a bit more for gas than I did several months ago, but gas is still cheaper now than it was at various times during the Biden, Obama, and even W administration…..in nominal terms, not even inflation adjusted. It seems to me that much of this hysteria over oil prices is manufactured.

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The New Neo

A blog about political change, among other things

Comments

The Strait of Hormuz — 4 Comments

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