Overview
- The energy agency now expects global oil demand to fall by about 420,000 barrels per day to roughly 104 million barrels per day this year.
- Global inventories are being depleted at a record pace after emergency reserve releases in March and April reduced recorded stocks by about 4 million barrels per day.
- Flows from the Persian Gulf remain largely halted after the Strait of Hormuz was effectively closed, choking a key route for oil and gas shipments.
- Brent crude spiked above $120 per barrel in March and was recently near $106, with the IEA warning of a deepening destruction of demand.
- The agency projects a market that stays massively undersupplied until October and notes governments are curbing use through conservation, price controls or fuel rationing.