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Stocks sell off, oil surges in the wake of Israeli strikes
Oil prices have surged more than 9 percent, hitting their highest in almost five months after Israel struck Iran, dramatically escalating tensions in the Middle East and raising worries about disrupted oil supplies.
Brent crude futures jumped $6.29, or 9.07 percent, to $75.65 a barrel by 0315 GMT after hitting an intraday high of $78.50, the highest since January 27. US West Texas Intermediate crude was up $6.43, or 9.45 percent, at $74.47 a barrel after hitting a high of $77.62, the loftiest since January 21.
Friday’s gains were the largest intraday moves for both contracts since 2022 after Russia invaded Ukraine, causing energy prices to spike.
“The question now is whether this is a typical geopolitical knee-jerk reaction from markets, which results in lots of hype with no delivery. Or if the US really is on the brink of navigating a Middle East war”, Matt Simpson, senior market analyst at City Index in Brisbane, Australia, told Reuters news agency.
In other markets, stocks dived in early Asian trade, led by a selloff in US futures, while investors scurried to safe havens such as gold and the Swiss franc.
“The heightened geopolitical risks are being strongly felt in the FX [foreign exchange] market. With the rise in risk-off sentiment, the Japanese yen is likely to be bought”, said Hirofumi Suzuki, chief FX strategist at SMBC in Tokyo.
Iran says six nuclear scientists killed in strikes
Iran’s Tasnim news agency is reporting that six Iranian nuclear scientists were killed in the Israeli strikes.
In a post on X, the agency reported that six scientists – Abdulhamid Minouchehr, Ahmadreza Zolfaghari, Seyyed Amirhossein Faqhi, Motlabizadeh, Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi and Fereydoun Abbasi – had been killed in the attacks.
“The Zionist regime showed that … it has come to war against our scientists using the tool of terror,” read the post.
Widespread support in Iran for retaliation against Israel
Mohammad Eslami, a research fellow at Tehran University, said Iranian leaders are preparing an imminent strike on Israel targeting military and nuclear facilities.
“The Iranian military were thinking about this scenario for many years and also in recent days we have heard lots of statements by the Defence Ministry of Iran that they are ready for any strike by the Israelis,” he told Al Jazeera from Tehran.
The government also has the support of all Iranian political parties, much as during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. “Most Iranian political parties support defending the country because all Iranians [know] the history of Iraq attacking Iran. This is not about political points of view,” he said.
