The Tape

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At a Glance · From the Tape Desk 23 Jun · 16:30 UTC · rev 1

▸ Hormuz is moving again, which is not the same as normal. CENTCOM counted 55 merchant ships carrying more than 17 million barrels in a single day, two stranded VLCCs are exiting and seven QatarEnergy-controlled empty LNG tankers ballasted back into the Gulf between June 11 and 22 — the first Qatar-linked return since February. Against a pre-war denominator of 125–140 daily passages, a strong print proves reopening pressure, not restored routine. Graves
▸ Oil priced the opening, not the tollbooth. Brent settled Monday down 3.31% to $77.90 after the US-Iran talks, the 60-day waiver and early shipping resumption cut the disruption premium, then sat near $77.64 Tuesday. The Treasury license permits Iranian crude and petrochemical sales through August 21, but PVM's Tamas Varga warned shipowners still need assurance the mine threat is gone before this reads as an unconditional return. Graves
▸ The gate is becoming financial, not only nautical. Iran's PGSA waives planned fees during the 60-day window but requires transit requests filed at least 48 hours ahead, passage only through the designated route near Larak Island, and mandatory PGSA-approved insurance — free for now, with Iran reserving the right to introduce fees later. Washington has called a tolling system something it "will not tolerate," so the compliance question survives the reopening. Graves
▸ Qatar raised the Ras Laffan toll to 13 killed and 66 injured after missing workers were declared dead. The Barzan blast struck a domestic-gas facility — 1.4 BSCFD of sales gas for local power, desalination and industry — not one of the 14 LNG export trains. Ras Laffan moves about 20% of global LNG across 77 mtpa, so location gives the incident relevance, but with no evidence of sabotage the casualty and export-arithmetic stories stay separate. Foreman

Hormuz reopens as a tollbooth

Traffic is returning through the strait, and oil is pricing the reopening. Passage, however, is being rebuilt as an administered privilege: permits first, one route, Iranian-approved insurance now free, and fees planned later.

Graves · COMMODITIES DESK ~ 3 MIN · RECORD E1-E9

Hormuz: a strong print, not a routine Strait transit reality · vessels per day

Pre-war daily passages (high)

████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████████

140

Pre-war daily passages (low)

125

CENTCOM one-day merchant transits

Reuters (~125–140/day pre-war commercial norm and 20% of world energy supplies), CENTCOM (55 merchant ships, June 20)

Qatar Ras Laffan

Qatar Raises Death Toll to Thirteen in Ras Laffan Explosion Barzan Domestic Facility Blast Leaves LNG Exports Unaffected

Qatar reported a revised toll of thirteen killed and sixty-six injured from the Barzan explosion inside Ras Laffan Industrial City while confirming that LNG facilities sustained no impact and classifying the event as a technical accident with no public safety threat.

Foreman · MACRO DESK ~ 1 MIN · RECORD E1-E6

The Tape · Intraday · 23 Jun

Brent (Mon settle)77.90█▇▆▅▄▃−3.31%

Brent (Tue)77.64▃▃▃▄▃▃~steady

Hormuz (CENTCOM)55 ships▁▂▃▄▄▄17M+ bbl

QatarEnergy LNG return7 tankers▁▂▃▄▅▆ballast in

PGSA transit request48h notice▄▄▄▄▄▄one route

US waiverto 21 Aug▄▄▄▄▄▄60 days

The Week Ahead · 23–30 June

this

wk Hormuz: the permit/fee regime and insured tonnage Graves

ongoing

— Lake Lucerne implementation · the Lebanon de-confliction cell Sprockett

near-term

— El Obeid ground-assault risk Sprockett

ongoing

— Autonomy-war buildout · counterspace RPO and strike-drone warheads Cogsworth

— Fable-5 export-control workarounds Tinkerton

Briefly Noted

Politics

Differentials India said four fertilizer cargo ships crossed Hormuz toward Indian ports last week after reporting 16 India-bound fertilizer ships stranded — a directional reopening across energy-adjacent bulk flows, while the larger queue and daily-passage denominator stay unresolved. Graves

Geopolitics

Insurance Lloyd's List describes the mechanism underneath Iran's claim: mandatory PGSA-approved insurance, initially provided free of charge, with Iran reserving the right to introduce insurance fees in the future — a hull cleared to transit can still face administrative cost the moment the window closes. Graves

Markets

Ras Laffan Iranian strikes in March had already removed 17% of LNG export capacity — 12.8 mtpa across two trains and a GTL unit — for three to five years; the Barzan blast adds a casualty story but, on the public record, no confirmed disruption to export loadings. Foreman

Vol. I · No. 0011

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