Brent Crashes From $119 After Trump Signals Ceasefire and G7 Floats Record Reserve Release

The Spike and the Reversal

Brent crude opened Sunday's session with a 30% gap higher, touching $119.50 per barrel — its highest level since Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. The catalyst for the spike was Saturday's Israeli air raids on four Iranian oil storage facilities and a transfer center in Tehran and Alborz province, the first direct strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure since the joint US-Israeli campaign began on February 28.

By Monday's close, the picture had flipped entirely. Brent settled near $89, and post-settlement trading briefly pushed prices toward $80 before stabilizing around $91. The roughly $30 round-trip — from $90 to $119 and back — played out in under 24 hours, with Hyperliquid's BRENTOIL perp tracking the move in real time.

Trump's Dovish Pivot

The reversal began when Trump told CBS News the war would end "very soon" and dismissed the oil spike as "artificial." He floated two concrete policy moves: waiving oil-related sanctions on Iran and ordering U.S. Navy escorts for tankers transiting the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump backed the claims with operational specifics, asserting the U.S. had hit 5,000 targets in Iran, reduced Iran's missile capability to 10%, cut drone launches by 83%, and sunk more than 50 Iranian ships. Whether those numbers hold up, the market read them as a signal that Washington wants this wrapped up fast — and is willing to use carrots (sanctions relief, naval escorts) alongside sticks to reopen the Strait.

The S&P 500, which had been deeply red, gained as much as 1% following the CBS interview. But Trump also said the conflict would not be over "this week," introducing a floor under oil prices that kept Brent from fully unwinding.

The G7 Card

The second leg of the selloff came when the Financial Times reported that G7 finance ministers were discussing a coordinated release of emergency petroleum reserves. French President Macron, currently holding the G7 presidency, confirmed publicly that strategic reserves were "an envisaged option."

The numbers under discussion are enormous: U.S. officials have floated a 300 to 400 million barrel drawdown, roughly a quarter to a third of the IEA system's total public reserves. That would dwarf the 2022 coordinated release of 240 million barrels during the Ukraine crisis. For now, the G7 has delayed a final decision, but the credible threat alone was enough to cap the spike.

What to Watch

The Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed. No tankers are transiting, and Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait, and Iraq have all cut production as onshore storage fills up. Trump's Navy escort plan has no finalized implementation details, and analysts have questioned whether escort convoys can realistically reopen the chokepoint while Iran retains anti-ship missile capacity.

The market is now trading two competing narratives: a near-term ceasefire that reopens roughly 20 million barrels per day of at-risk production, or a prolonged blockade that forces the largest strategic reserve drawdown in history. Brent at $91 prices in a resolution within weeks. If the Strait stays closed through end of March, the math gets much worse — and the G7's reserve release trigger moves from "envisaged" to inevitable.

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