On the night of July 23, 2026, Brent crude’s September contract jumped by more than 6%. It was the first time since May 22 that it had returned to and held above the $100 per barrel integer level. WTI also surged to around $91, and the “two-canal linkage” supply panic in the Middle East was completely ignited.

The fuse was direct: after the Houthis announced a maritime blockade against Saudi Arabia, in the early hours they used missiles and drones to hit the Saudi oil tanker “Enseria” as it sailed through the Red Sea, sharply raising the risk level for the Bab el-Mandeb Strait. At the same time, the US-Iran conflict continued to escalate. Trump said, “Attacking ships counts as Iran’s debt,” and the US military launched repeated night raids on Iranian facilities. With the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb both becoming critically strained, two energy lifelines were suddenly in trouble at the same time. Asian buyers have already begun discussing rerouting options via Africa with Saudi Aramco.

The global transmission chain tightened in an instant: the US AAA gasoline average price broke above $4 per gallon; the yield on 10-year US Treasuries surged to an annual high; and the market’s pricing for the Federal Reserve’s September rate-hike probability jumped from 68% to 80%. The Nasdaq fell nearly 2% and Tesla dropped more than 12%, while energy and storage moved higher against the trend. Even though the European Central Bank held policy steady, its tone turned more hawkish, and imported inflation is making a comeback.

For China, this is “manageable but with structural divergence.” CF40’s oil-price modeling sees oil rising from $70 to $100, and China’s domestic PPI peak is lifted by about 1 percentage point. The impact on industrial value added and CPI is limited. Meanwhile, in terms of renminbi-denominated assets, risk-avoidance resilience remains relatively strong. In A-shares/H-shares, the typical pattern is “upstream reaping the benefits while midstream and downstream face pressure”—the logic centered on the “three barrels” (oil majors), oilfield services, coal, oil shipping, and renewable-energy substitution is in the lead. Aviation (where fuel costs account for 30%+), logistics, downstream petrochemicals, and high-valuation technology are hit by a double squeeze from both rate hikes and cost pressure.

$100 is not the endpoint—it is the starting point for a repricing of the risk premium. If the Strait of Hormuz is effectively interrupted, Goldman Sachs expects Q4 Brent at 120+ and an extreme scenario from RBC to challenge 146. But in the baseline case, the outlook is still “high-level choppy consolidation plus tail-end risks,” and the key is whether the US and Iran will leave room for negotiations over the next two weeks. For individuals, the most straightforward reminder of oil prices breaking above $100 is that travel costs, courier shipping fees, and prices of chemical consumer goods will quietly be rewritten within the quarter.