Oil Plummets As Trump Perceived To Retreat From Attacking Iran - For Now

Meanwhile, Russia's oil and gas budget takes a nosedive: File Image/Pixabay

Oil prices on Thursday plummeted along with perceived geopolitical risk, based on U.S. president Donald Trump seeming to rethink military strikes against Iran because he was informed by "very important sources" that the killing of protesters in that country "has stopped."

Brent settled down $2.76 at $63.76 per barrel, and West Texas Intermediate settled down $2.83 to $59.19.

Still, Washington issued an advisory to American citizens to leave Iran, and the U.S. Treasury Department on Thursday announced sanctions on the Islamic republic's secretary of the Supreme Council for National Security, for its brutal crackdown on demonstrators that is said to have resulted in several thousand deaths..

Meanwhile, three sources told media that Venezuela has begun reversing oil production cuts made under a U.S. embargo, with crude exports also resuming, and a supposedly positive phone call between Trump and acting president Delcy Rodriguez left analysts thinking that stable relations would lead to more oil leaving the South American country in coming weeks – and further bearish market sentiment.

Phil Flynn, senior market analyst with Price Futures Group Inc., said, "That will keep prices anchored."

In other oil news on Thursday, Julianne Geiger, a researcher at Oilprice.com, described Russia's oil and gas budget in 2025 as suffering "a painful blow, with revenues falling as 24 percent to 8.48 trillion roubles, the weakest showing since 2020.

Geiger wrote, "That matters, because oil and gas still bankroll roughly a quarter of the federal budget, and that budget is being chewed up by defence and security spending at a pace hard to ignore."

She concluded with regard to Western pressures against the former Soviet Union, "the latest 2025 data suggests that pressure has finally hit Russia where it hurts the most….the risk for Moscow now is a market that stays oversupplied."