Iran’s strategy in leveraging on control over the Strait of Hormuz looks to be working
When US president Trump earlier this week said the deal is "over", everyone feared the worst. However, he then toned things down by playing his go-to card in proclaiming that the other side wants to be making a deal. That tends to be his signal to de-escalate. And the latest headlines also suggest that there is perhaps a chance both sides can continue negotiations again.
While that may be leading to an ever so slightly calmer mood, it's not to say that the nightmare is over. In fact, it is still very much engulfing markets as the Strait of Hormuz returns to de facto closure again. Traffic along the waterway has ground to a halt with Iran not being happy about the US' attacks.
That being said, is it all just a ploy though?
As a reminder, control over the Strait of Hormuz is still Iran's biggest leverage in this whole war with the US. And the modus operandi of Tehran in negotiating with Washington is to keep kicking the can down the road.
In attacking ships along the strait, they are pretty much killing two birds with one stone. One is that they are reminding the US over their leverage of the strait and that they won't yield so easily in talks. The second is that if the US so decides to respond, Iran can easily use that as a reason to postpone or call off talks for a period of time.
On the latter, if they so wanted to then they could also easily point to Israel continuing strikes on Lebanon. But again, all of this is just for the optics.
Iran will say that "hey, look I've already opened the strait and traffic is picking up" (not that it really has). That before pointing the finger to the US that they are the ones violating the deal and now the strait is shut down again.
US president Trump might be able to feel comfortable in fighting back when oil prices are now sitting lower. However, what happens when prices go back up again and threatens the global economy and the US outlook? Or more importantly, his midterm election odds?
The whole point here is that Iran will use that kind of pressure to extract more give from the US, in demanding for more sanctions relief and release of their frozen funds. The main objective is to buy for time and prolong the status quo for as long as they can get away with it. And their biggest leverage to do that? Yes, control over the Strait of Hormuz.
And so the longer this "reopening" and closing of the strait continues, the worse it will be for global outlook. And there's a certain element of fear that markets are severely underestimating the reality of the situation.
The oil market is very much struggling in "depleting its savings" just to keep up with appearances. Meanwhile, global supply chains continue to be hampered and will remain heavily impacted by the chokehold on raw materials and increasing prices.
The worry here is that reality will slap hard when it finally comes knocking on the door. And that continues to be the threat that Iran looks to hang over the US and the rest of the world in this war.
This article was written by fl9bde53b91e184082bbe3aa3acaaf2cb0 at investinglive.com.提供 MainLink：Investinglive RSS Breaking News Feed
FX初心者には必須 無料のうちにGET！
