Hormuz Shipping Crisis Could Drag Into 2027, Tanker Giant Warns
Japan's largest shipping company now expects disruptions to Strait of Hormuz transits to extend into 2027, abandoning an earlier forecast of a return to normal operations by the end of this year.
Mitsui O.S.K. Lines (MOL) CEO Jotaro Tamura told reporters that "given the current situation, it's difficult to see operations resuming in any form by the end of the year," according to a report published by OilPrice.com on September 3, 2026. As recently as July, MOL had projected a gradual resumption of transits starting in October 2026, with full normalization by January 2027. That projection has now been abandoned.
Key facts
- Strait of Hormuz traffic has collapsed to "merely a handful of observable daily transits" following the latest round of military exchanges between the United States and Iran, the first such strikes in over a month, per the same report.
- Some vessels are reportedly making "dark crossings" — transits with tracking systems disabled or unofficial flagging — a sign of how constrained normal shipping has become.
- Asian spot LNG prices reached $24.614 per MMBtu in early September, a five-month high, up from $23.388 the prior week, according to a separate OilPrice.com report from September 1, 2026.
- European benchmark TTF gas prices jumped 5% to around $82.60/€71.20 per MWh, the highest level in more than three and a half years, since January 2023.
- QatarEnergy has extended force majeure on some LNG deliveries into November, and buyers including Pakistan, Bangladesh, South Korea, Taiwan and India are seeking replacement spot cargoes.
Why it matters
The Strait of Hormuz carries a large share of the world's seaborne LNG and oil trade. According to an earlier analysis by Wood Mackenzie, a full closure removes about 1.5 million tonnes per week (2.2 bcm) of LNG supply from the market — roughly 19% of global LNG exports — with about 90% of Qatari and Emirati LNG normally flowing to Asian buyers. Taiwan is especially exposed, since Qatar and the UAE supplied 35% of its 2025 LNG imports (8.4 million tonnes) and the island lost its last nuclear-power fallback after a reactor shutdown in mid-2025. Wood Mackenzie's Asia Pacific gas research director, Miaoru Huang, noted that "Asian LNG spot prices have surged above US$20/mmbtu, shifting from a discount" relative to European prices to a premium.
Industrial and economic impact
A shipping bottleneck of this scale and duration reaches far beyond energy trading desks. Higher LNG and gas prices raise electricity and feedstock costs for industries that depend on gas-fired power or gas as a chemical feedstock — from steel and cement to fertilizers and petrochemicals — in every economy that imports LNG through routes affected by Gulf shipping risk. Longer voyage times, higher insurance premiums (war-risk cover in particular), and vessel rerouting also raise freight costs for any cargo, industrial or otherwise, that would normally transit the Gulf.
For Iranian industrial exporters and importers, the relevance is direct rather than indirect: the strait in question is Iran's own maritime gateway. Elevated transit risk, higher insurance costs for vessels calling at Iranian ports, and the broader disruption to regional energy trade all affect the cost and reliability of importing machinery, spare parts and raw materials, and of exporting petrochemical and metal products through the Gulf.
What to watch
Key signals to track in the coming weeks include whether MOL and other major carriers (or their insurers) further revise resumption timelines, whether QatarEnergy extends force majeure beyond November, and whether Asian and European gas benchmarks keep climbing into the northern-hemisphere winter heating season, when demand for LNG typically rises regardless of the Hormuz situation.
