• WTI jumped 16% from a low near $68 to $85.45 on July 22 after the U.S.-Iran ceasefire broke down, per FX Leaders.
• The dispute is jurisdictional: FX Leaders reports Iran asserts control over the Strait of Hormuz while the U.S. insists on free commercial transit.
• OilPrice.com's Reuters-sourced reporting says Chinese refinery crude runs fell to 2020 pandemic-era lows in June, and August delivery ramp-ups are now at risk of delay.
• The EIA's long-standing baseline puts Hormuz flow at roughly a fifth of world oil trade, leaving thin margin for a sustained disruption.
• This is analysis of confirmed price moves and reported flow disruption. Not advice.

WTI jumped roughly 16% to $85.45 on July 22, according to FX Leaders' market analysis published that morning, after the U.S.-Iran ceasefire collapsed over a dispute about who controls transit through the Strait of Hormuz. OilPrice.com's Reuters-sourced reporting says Asian refiners, and Chinese processors in particular, now face delayed August crude deliveries as a result. The price jump is a confirmed market move; how long the underlying supply threat lasts is not yet settled. This is analysis of price and flow data, not advice.

What repriced overnight

WTI traded at $85.45 on July 22, up roughly 16% from a recent low near $68, according to FX Leaders' market analysis published that morning. The move tracks the collapse of a U.S.-Iran ceasefire that had, in late June and early July, tentatively reopened crude flows through the Strait of Hormuz. The jump is a confirmed price move; the durability of the underlying supply threat is not yet settled, and this is a read on flow data, not advice.

What broke the truce

Per FX Leaders' reporting, the dispute is jurisdictional: Iran asserts the Strait of Hormuz is under its control, while the United States maintains the waterway must remain open to free commercial transit. That basic disagreement is what OilPrice.com's Reuters-sourced analyst commentary says undid the U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding that had briefly eased tanker traffic in late June. Neither side's legal position is adjudicated here; both are reported claims, not settled fact.

Why Asian refiners are exposed

OilPrice.com's Reuters-sourced analysts say Chinese refinery crude-processing volumes had already fallen in June to levels last seen at the 2020 pandemic trough, while refiners in the U.S. and Europe were running near capacity. Asian refiners had bet on rising Middle East volumes to ramp up August processing; the ceasefire collapse now threatens to delay those loadings, per the same reporting. Confirmed: the June processing slump. Reported, not yet confirmed: the size of the August delay.

The Hormuz math behind the premium

The EIA's chokepoint analysis puts total oil flow through the Strait of Hormuz at roughly a fifth of world oil trade, a baseline the agency has maintained since it first sized the waterway's daily throughput. That concentration is why even a partial, unconfirmed disruption moves price: there is little slack elsewhere to absorb a sustained cut to a route carrying that large a share of seaborne crude and refined product.

What to watch next

Three data points will show whether this is a brief repricing or a longer supply event: China's next official refinery run-rate readout, any independent verification of Hormuz vessel-transit counts, and whether the Houthi threat to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait cited in OilPrice.com's reporting materializes into an actual second chokepoint disruption. None of the three is confirmed yet. This is analysis of what the data shows, not advice.