Weekly Energy Market Recap: Jul 31 - Aug 7, 2026

Key Takeaways

• Iran's parliament is reviewing a draft plan, developed with Oman, to ban US- and Israeli-linked vessels from the Strait of Hormuz until Tehran is compensated for war damage, with violators facing fines of up to 20% of cargo value, according to AGBI.
• ADNOC said 15 of its vessels have been hit by missiles or drones since the war began, including three attacks this week, leaving one crew member dead and 20 injured, OilPrice.com reported.
• Libya's National Oil Corporation told Bloomberg it is confident the country can raise crude output to 2 million barrels per day by the early 2030s from roughly 1.4 million bpd currently, backed by a new $2 billion operating budget.
• Guinea selected Glencore as the offtaker for bauxite produced by state-owned Nimba Mining following an international tender, according to Mining Technology.
• Gold surged to a seven-week high and silver climbed even faster after the US economy unexpectedly shed 23,000 jobs in July, weakening the case for a September Federal Reserve rate hike, MINING.COM reported.

Oil & Gas Markets

Geopolitical risk around the Strait of Hormuz dominated the oil and gas news cycle this week. According to AGBI, an initial draft proposal negotiated between Iran and Oman would ban US and Israeli vessels from transiting the Strait of Hormuz until compensation is paid for war damages, with the proposal reportedly including a fine of up to 20 percent of a cargo's value for violators. The same report noted that Brent crude futures rose 1.2 percent to $83.48 a barrel while WTI futures gained 1.1 percent to $78.84, with both benchmarks having fallen 5 to 8 percent over the prior five days but still up nearly 28 percent since January 1. President Trump, for his part, said on Thursday that a deal to reopen the strait had not been finalised, per Fox News as cited by AGBI.

The toll on shipping is mounting. OilPrice.com reported that ADNOC said attacks on its vessels and employees are having a significant impact on operations as the company tries to keep crude, gas and refined products moving through the Strait of Hormuz, with fifteen ADNOC vessels hit by missiles or drones since the war began, including three this week, leaving one crew member killed and 20 others injured. The outlet added that the Strait of Hormuz carried roughly one-fifth of global oil consumption before the war expanded into a broader regional conflict, and repeated attacks have disrupted traffic, driven freight costs sharply higher, and made some shipowners reluctant to enter the Persian Gulf. Despite the risk, OilPrice.com noted ADNOC is expanding capacity, having acquired six very large crude carriers and five very large gas carriers for about $1.3 billion, with nine of those vessels scheduled to enter service this quarter.

Elsewhere, Libya's oil sector is angling for a comeback. OilPrice.com reported that NOC chairman Masoud Suleman told Bloomberg the country could raise oil production to 2 million barrels per day by early next decade from about 1.4 million bpd now. Suleman credited a new fiscal lifeline, noting that a 2026 unified budget brokered with US help gives the NOC more than $2 billion as an operating budget, after the company received no funding at all in the 2025 budget. He added, "The era of delayed funding, which used to cause problems and concerns, both for us and our partners, is now behind us."

On the LNG front, Natural Gas Intel reported that BP said this week it would take full ownership of the Calypso natural gas project offshore Trinidad and Tobago with the acquisition of Woodside Energy's 70% stake for an undisclosed price, in the same dispatch covering ConocoPhillips' outlook on Qatar's North Field East LNG project. In US gas markets, Natural Gas Intel reported that New York Mercantile Exchange natural gas futures inched higher at midday on Friday as bargain buyers stepped in following a weeklong slump and amid hints of rising LNG demand (headline: "Bargain Buying Props Up Natural Gas Futures"). Longer term, the outlet also reported that management teams of leading US natural gas producers expect currently oversupplied conditions to give way to a tighter market and stronger pricing by the end of next year, referencing a report titled "US Natural Gas Execs See Supply Tightening by Late 2027." Regionally, Natural Gas Intel noted that Midwest and East storage levels rose to abundant levels heading into winter amid strong production, while SoCal Citygate price spreads widened even as new pipeline capacity came online upstream.

Renewable Energy Developments

Coverage this week leaned toward the utility and EV side of the transition rather than utility-scale renewables. Utility Dive reported that Constellation Energy's CEO described existing power plants as essential to meeting surging data center demand, noting that Constellation Energy expects Texas' Batch Zero large load interconnection process will resume without "meaningful delay." Separately, Utility Dive published commentary from GridX arguing that legacy billing infrastructure is holding back grid modernization efforts even as utilities pour billions into upgrades.

On the electric vehicle side, Electrek reported that Tesla has acknowledged a defect in the power conversion system of pre-2026 Cybertrucks and is extending the warranty on those trucks to 8 years or 150,000 miles. Electrek also reported that Subaru's aggressive EV incentives have boosted sales but are taking a financial toll, while startup Telo raised the tow rating on its compact electric truck. Renewable Energy World flagged that utilities' shifting approach to grid reliability and resiliency will be a focus of the upcoming DTECH Reliability & Resiliency conference on August 25. Overall, this week's renewable and grid coverage centered more on distribution-level utility challenges and EV product news than on new wind, solar, or storage capacity.

Mining & Critical Minerals

Precious metals rallied sharply this week on a surprise US labor market slump. MINING.COM reported that gold surged to a seven-week high and silver climbed even faster Friday after the US economy unexpectedly shed jobs in July, with Comex December gold rising 2.3% to $4,401 an ounce and September silver jumping 3.6% to $63.85 an ounce, both reaching seven-week highs. The underlying data was striking: US nonfarm payrolls fell by 23,000 in July compared with expectations for an increase of about 80,000, while June employment was revised down to a gain of 20,000 and May to 63,000, reducing the 12-month average to 34,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate edged down to 4.1% as labour-force participation slipped to its lowest in more than five years. MINING.COM noted the report reduce[d] September rate-hike odds to 44%, weakening the dollar's appeal relative to non-yielding metals.

In battery and industrial metals, Mining Technology reported that the Government of Guinea has selected Glencore as the offtaker for bauxite produced by Nimba Mining, the country's state-owned miner, as authorities seek to exercise greater oversight over bauxite export volumes, with Minister of Mines and Geology Bouna Sylla confirming Glencore was chosen through an international tender process. Nimba Mining, which took over the former Guinea Alumina concession last year, has exported four million tons of bauxite this year and expects to ship between 8 million and 10 million tonnes by year-end, before raising output to 12 million tonnes in 2027.

In West African gold, B2Gold announced that the State of Mali has granted the company a Fekola Regional Exploitation Permit, according to the company's release. In US coal, Alpha Metallurgical Resources reported a second-quarter net loss of $12.3 million alongside Adjusted EBITDA of $25.6 million for the period, per its PR Newswire release.

Week Ahead Preview

Markets will continue watching for any formal resolution — or escalation — of the Strait of Hormuz standoff, with Iran's parliament weighing the US/Israel shipping ban proposal and Washington signaling openness to a deal even as attacks on tankers continue. Natural gas traders will be tracking whether the "bargain buying" seen Friday, per Natural Gas Intel, extends into next week, along with weather-driven demand shifts in storage-rich regions like the Midwest and East. On the metals side, follow-through in gold and silver after this week's jobs-driven rally, and how the Federal Reserve's rate path evolves in response, are likely to remain focal points given the reduced odds of a September hike cited by MINING.COM. Investors should also watch Libya's progress toward its 2 million bpd target as new licensing rounds and oil major partnerships develop.

This weekly recap is compiled from coverage by OilPrice.com, Natural Gas Intel, AGBI, MINING.COM, Mining Technology, Utility Dive, Electrek, Renewable Energy World, and PR Newswire. For daily updates, visit stakeandpaper.com.