Tankers moving along the Strait of Hormuz dwindled further this week, with only five crossings on Wednesday and nine crossings on Thursday, down from a monthly average of 12 crossings, according to data from Kpler, as cited by Reuters. Five tankers went into the waterway yesterday, according to the data, and four exited it, most of them moving along the Iranian corridor. Traffic via the Bab el-Mandeb strait in the Red Sea was in the double digits, with Kpler reporting 19 commodity carriers passing the waterway on Thursday. The data only covers vessels with their transponders switched on, Reuters noted in its report. Meanwhile, the United States threatened to extend its naval blockade of Iran indefinitely, and add more sanctions to an already long list to choke Iran’s economy. “Indefinitely, the United States Navy can maintain a blockade like that because we’ll rotate ships in and out, as we have, and we’ll continue to,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told media, as quoted by Reuters. “Watch this space for more announcements coming next week because we are going to apply measures like have never been seen in the history of economic isolation on a country,” Hegseth also said on Thursday. These statements suggest the conflict is nowhere near a resolution, yet oil prices did not reflect that, with traders instead focusing on the news that U.S. commercial inventories had added over 17.4 million barrels last week.

However, global inventories are depleting, including those from the massive releases from the strategic stockpile, while China, which has kept oil futures prices in check with a decade-low import level in May and June, is now back to buying more crude.

If the stalemate over the U.S.-Iran talks and the Strait of Hormuz control persists for a few more weeks, the physical oil market could reach the much-feared tipping point, beyond which shortages would be felt, and prices would spike, analysts say.