New US strikes near Hormuz, Iran announces military response

On September 1, US President Donald Trump announced that the United States armed forces were at that moment striking Iranian targets near the Strait of Hormuz, as reported by the Anadolu agency’s morning briefing. A few hours later, the United States Central Command, Centcom, declared operations against Iranian military targets concluded. In the evening, Tehran announced the start of a military response operation, naming American bases and interests in the region as targets: this is reported both by Anadolu and by the September 1 market review, which gathers statements from the White House and Tehran.

According to Trump, any Iranian retaliation would be followed by even harder strikes. This is the formula on which the day closed from the American side: no damage assessment, no precise location of the targets, no list of the assets deployed.

The maritime passage

The night before the strikes, two oil tankers — one Saudi and one South Korean-owned — had been hit by projectiles in the passage area. TheStreet’s review describes two supertankers hit by unidentified projectiles while transiting the Strait: the source of the fire, in none of the available sources, is attributed to a specific actor.

Traffic behavior says more than the statements. Some oil tankers have switched off their transponders, that is the systems that transmit their position and identity; meanwhile Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Iraq continue to export through the same stretch of sea. These are two facts that coexist: the passage is functioning, but part of those crossing it are choosing not to be seen. The risk shifts from the physical closure of the channel to the cost of crossing it — insurance, waiting times, route diversions — and this cost does not appear in any military statement.

Some oil tankers have switched off their transponders, while four major Gulf exporters continue loading.

The price

The market reacted before the chancelleries did. According to quotes recorded by Trading Economics, crude oil closed on September 1 at 90.82 dollars per barrel, up 5.90% on the previous day and 13.05% over the past month. The yield on the US ten-year Treasury note rose to around 4.8%, the highest level since January 2025, and traders increased bets on a Federal Reserve rate hike in September. The three main Wall Street indices closed lower.

The chain is the classic one of an energy shock: rising energy prices, revised inflation expectations, sell-offs in government bonds, higher expected cost of money. With one difference compared to crises in which oil rises due to an announced supply cut: here physical supply, for now, continues to move.

The regional backdrop

On the same day, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced that Turkey would deepen cooperation with the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. Anadolu reports this alongside the coverage of the strikes: a NATO member publicizing a rapprochement with a format led by China and Russia, on the day the United States strikes in the Gulf, is a positioning signal that the parties to the conflict will read before the markets do.

What we don’t know

We do not know the number, nature or location of the targets struck by Centcom, nor any casualty or damage assessment: none of the available sources indicate this, and no independent verification on the ground is currently available. We do not know whether the response operation announced by Iran has already begun operationally or whether it remains, for now, merely an announcement. We do not know who struck the two oil tankers, nor whether the two episodes — the attack on the ships and the US raids — are connected: the sources place them in temporal sequence, not in a causal relationship.

The starting data are Monday’s: crude at 90.82 dollars per barrel, US ten-year note around 4.8%, four Gulf exporters that as of September 1 continued loading through the Strait, and some oil tankers with their transponders switched off.