Brent settles below $80 as Bessent says a Strait of Hormuz deal could come within a day, and United States stocks set records

Brent crude settled below $80 a barrel on Tuesday, its second consecutive decline of roughly 5 percent, after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Washington and Tehran could announce an agreement to reopen the Strait of Hormuz to commercial shipping within a day. "We are in talks with the Iranians, and I think there is a chance we may have a deal today or tomorrow to open the strait and move towards a more normalized position in this conflict," Bessent said in an interview with CNBC. Brent fell about 5.3 percent to $79.36 a barrel and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) lost about 5.7 percent to $75.77, with both benchmarks reaching three-week lows. The strait normally carries about one-fifth of the world's seaborne oil.

The accounts of who is negotiating still do not match. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said talks involving the United States, Iran and Oman on expanding commercial shipping through the strait had advanced but were not settled. "There's been progress made in those talks, but not finality yet. We're hoping that will happen very shortly," he told reporters at the State Department. Iran maintains it is not negotiating directly with Washington and that its only channel is Oman. Qatar's foreign ministry spokesman, Majed Al Ansari, said Qatar, Oman and Pakistan are passing draft proposals between the two sides. That pattern repeats an earlier exchange, when President Donald Trump said he had called off a major strike on Iran because negotiations were already under way. "We are talking right now," he said, according to The Hindu's running account. Iran's foreign ministry spokesman, Esmaeil Baghaei, replied that "at present, we are not having any negotiations with the US." The Hindu notes that announcement followed by denial has recurred through the conflict.

Equity investors treated the cheaper barrel as a gain to earnings. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at a record, rising about 705 points to 53,883.84, and the S&P 500 traded above 7,700 for an intraday record before finishing at 7,645.68, helped by raised forecasts from Palantir Technologies and Caterpillar. On Monday the Dow had gained about 693 points to 53,178.41, the S&P 500 1.48 percent to 7,600.50 and the Nasdaq Composite about 2.1 percent to 25,913.9, as United States indexes closed near their highs.

Precious metals moved in the opposite direction as the premium tied to war risk fell. Gold futures opened Monday around $4,135 a troy ounce with spot metal near $4,046, and silver traded close to $58 an ounce. Both eased as the immediate threat of strikes receded.

The market is now pricing an agreement that no party has signed. Goldman Sachs expects Brent to hold between $80 and $90 a barrel until either a confirmed United States-Iran agreement or a clear escalation in strikes, according to OilPrice.com. The physical costs of the war do not reverse at the speed of a futures contract. The Japan Times recounts the case of Mohammad Shafiqul Islam, a Bangladeshi seafarer who spent 115 days stranded in the Gulf, rationing food and water for his crew while missiles passed overhead. Insurance, crewing and routing costs built up over months of fighting do not fall by 5 percent because a deal may be near.