Brent crude crossed $100/bbl intraday Wednesday, its first close above that level since May 26, up ~6-7% in 24 hours to the $100-101 range. WTI followed to ~$90-92, up ~5-6%. The move clears the 5%/24h threshold this desk tracks for a confirmed oil-price alert; this morning's reading of +4.7-4.9% had sat just under it.
The driver is repricing, not a new confirmed barrel loss. Tuesday's strike on the Saudi-flagged tanker Encelia at Bab el-Mandeb, confirmed by UK Maritime Trade Operations and the Saudi Press Agency, has hardened into a market view that the Houthi blockade against Saudi Arabia is operational rather than rhetorical. A Houthi claim of a second tanker, the Layla, struck in the same waters remains unconfirmed by independent sources. Rhetoric has escalated on both sides since: Trump has floated a "massive attack, bigger than ever" and "major military punishment" against the Houthis, while Iran's foreign minister has repeated an "eye for an eye" warning naming third-party enablers as targets. Neither has been executed.
~10 vessels have now diverted from Saudi-bound Red Sea routes since the blockade began, and charterers are already routing some Yanbu-to-Asia cargo around the Cape of Good Hope, more than double the direct transit time. Saudi Arabia's East-West Pipeline to Yanbu remains its only bypass around the closed Strait of Hormuz, and that route's sea exit now has a confirmed casualty attached to it.
OPEC+ has given no signal of an out-of-cycle response; its last move was the July 5 quota increase. Watch for Saudi Arabia's unexecuted threat of force against the blockade, independent confirmation of the Layla strike, and whether the ceasefire track moves from cooling toward a stated rejection.