Dear Fellow Investor,
Overnight, the last legal authorization to buy, sell, or transport Iranian oil anywhere on Earth expired.
General License X1 — the final sanctions waiver still standing — hit zero at 12:01 a.m.
As of this morning, every Iranian oil transaction on the planet is illegal under U.S. law.
Every single one.
And almost nobody noticed.
Because the market is too busy watching the wrong chokepoint.
Yes — the Strait of Hormuz is in crisis.
Crude flows through the Strait collapsed from 9.4 million barrels a day to 5.5 million — in a single week.
Only nine ships crossed on Wednesday.
Zero supertankers.
Zero LNG carriers.
Before the war, 138 ships passed through every single day.
Oil is up 12% this week.
Brent is pushing toward $85. Goldman says it could hit $110.
On Polymarket, traders are pricing a 98.65% chance that Hormuz traffic won't normalize by the end of July.
You already know this.
Every cable news channel in America has a live map of the Strait on the screen right now.
Here's what they're not showing you.
Yesterday, Reuters broke a story that should be the lead on every financial broadcast on the planet.
Iran told the Houthis to prepare to close the Red Sea.
Not Hormuz.
The Red Sea.
Three sources told Reuters that Iran's leadership has conveyed the
message to its Houthi allies in Yemen:
If the U.S. strikes Iranian power infrastructure, shut down the Bab el-Mandeb Strait — the narrow gateway at the bottom of the Red Sea.
A source close to the Houthis said they've already completed preparations.
Missiles and drones deployed near the Strait.
IRGC officers are already on the ground in Yemen.
Awaiting the order.
Why does this matter?
Because the Red Sea is the only lifeline the global oil market has left.
When Hormuz shut down in March, Saudi Arabia scrambled to reroute 70% of its crude exports through a pipeline to its Red Sea port at Yanbu.
That port is now shipping 4 million barrels a day — up from under a million a year ago.
The Red Sea currently carries roughly 7% of global oil supply — not because it normally does, but because there's nowhere else for it to go.
It's the backup generator keeping the lights on for the entire world economy.
And Iran just told someone to pull the plug.
If that order comes, both of the world's two major oil chokepoints will
be shut at the same time.
That has never happened in modern history.
Not during the Gulf War.
Not during the Iran-Iraq War.
Not during the Arab oil embargo of 1973.
Never.
Now here's where it gets truly strange.
While the real world is hurtling toward a dual energy blockade with no historical precedent…
Wall Street is running in the other direction.
Energy sector funds just posted their largest weekly outflows since
April 2025.
Hedge funds are liquidating exploration and production positions.
The herd is sprinting for the exit.
At the exact moment when roughly a quarter of the world's oil transit could go dark.
I've been doing this long enough to know what that gap means.
When the crowd runs one direction and reality screams in the other, you don't follow the crowd.
You find the company standing at the center of the storm.
I found it.
I've been investigating the forces behind this conflict — and where the real money is moving.
That investigation led me to a single company.
One that sits at the dead center of America's energy infrastructure.
One that benefits every single time a barrel of oil doesn't cross an ocean.
I've just published a full briefing — the company, the ticker, and the date every energy investor needs to know.
Hormuz is paralyzed. The Red Sea could be next. And as of this morning, every Iranian barrel on Earth is illegal.
“The Buck Stops Here,”
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Written by Dylan Jovine