Crude oil prices eased marginally on Monday after hitting six-month highs, Brent crude prices had crossed 117 dollars per barrel; however currently prices remain
above 114 dollars per barrel (at the time of filing this copy). Experts believe persistent concerns over geopolitical developments and oil supply worries have kept the oil market volatile. The concerns about energy supplies escalated after Houthis continued to strike Saudi Arabia. The US State Department ordered all non-essential personnel to leave Saudi Arabia due to the strikes. However, US President Donald Trump also said that the "US was not negotiating with Iran and something would happen fairly soon." His cryptic remarks came as US officials told The New York Times that the US and Israel have plans for fresh strikes on Iran after the midterm elections. Global oil expert and CEO-Australia, Trading.com & Chief Strategist Asia-Pacific XM.com, Peter McGuire told Times Now Digital, "energy markets react with fear of attacks by Iran on Gulf-based AI data centres and critical infrastructure including undersea cables." Times Now Digital had spoken to Anant Ladha, Founder of Invest Aaj For Kal about the impact of rising oil prices on India and the stock markets and he had said, "crude is a big risk for the Indian stock market. India imports majority of crude and if crude prices are high, input cost of all the companies go for a toss and we see that it will directly impact the EPS growth rate and the earning profitability of the companies. Markets are slaves of earnings and if something is affecting earnings, it will affect equity markets as well. So crude is a bigger risk for Indian market as compared to interest rates, which are rising in the US. So we'll have to understand this right now. Crude is trading past 110 dollars per barrel currently, so till the time we don't see it going below 90 or 85 dollars per barrel, it will always be a headwind whenever the stock market will try to rise."
