Trump’s curveballs have limited sway in oil markets
With oil prices back to where they were at the start of the year, the oil market has offered a collective shrug to the geopolitical curveballs thrown its way. Although Canada and Mexico have been granted a temporary reprieve, as it stands US tariffs will be imposed on oil imports from early March. The effects of US tariffs could manifest themselves in several ways and our new Oil Tariff Impact Tracker uses high-frequency data to track oil output, trade flows and prices in North America. Aside from trade policy, the other card up President Trump's sleeve is the extent to which he imposes sanctions on Russia and Iran's oil trade; comments last week suggest a return to his maximum pressure campaign on the latter is likely. One area where Trump may have less influence, though, is on domestic supply. Our base case for oil prices to fall suggests oil executives won't embrace "drill, baby, drill!"
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