Ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz remained blocked Thursday, even as a handful of Chinese vessels lined up to escape, with a very fragile ceasefire between the US and Iran yet to improve traffic flows in the region.

The latest US sanctions on oil tankers hauling Russian petroleum look set to cause severe disruption across the nation’s export machine, with some of Moscow’s flows at risk of a near wipeout if history is any guide.

A near-total ban on imports of Russian crude into the European Union is finally hitting Russia’s oil revenue. Concerns that it would provide the Kremlin with a windfall to fund its war in Ukraine have been confounded — for now.

Oil markets are broken. Extreme volatility and a lack of liquidity mean that crude futures have become disconnected from tight physical oil markets. At least that’s what some loud voices in the oil world are telling us.

Recent revisions to oil demand forecasts aren’t as bullish as they might appear. Don’t get too excited about prices going up just yet.