(March 19): Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said the US may move to unsanction Iranian oil supply that’s “on the water” within days to help drive down prices.
“In the coming days, we may unsanction the Iranian oil that’s on the water,” Bessent said on Fox Business Thursday.
The US is already allowing Iranian oil to pass through the Strait of Hormuz, and that nation has about 140 million barrels “on the water,” the Treasury chief said. “Depending on how you count it, that’s 10 days to two weeks of supply.”
“We will be using the Iranian barrels against the Iranians to keep the price down for the next 10 or 14 days as we continue this campaign,” Bessent said.
By the time the US moves to “unsanction” floating Iranian oil, there will have been “about 260 million excess barrels of energy” created, Bessent said — pointing to also to the release of reserves of oil by a number of countries.
“The US could unilaterally do another SPR release to keep the price down,” he also said, referring to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Bessent noted that there had been some speculation the US Treasury would intervene in the oil futures market, but “we’re absolutely not doing that.”
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“We are not going to do a financial market intervention,” he also said. “We’re not intervening in the financial markets. We are supplying the physical markets.”
Uploaded by Magessan Varatharaja
