[MARKET ANALYSIS] Commodities extend on recent gains with oil underpinned by geopolitical uncertainty following Iran and Trump tit-for-tat raparation demands

WTI/Brent: WTI Sep'26 +0.4% / Brent Sep'26 +0.3%

• Oil futures remain afloat after rallying yesterday by more than 5% in the absence of a Strait of Hormuz deal and with efforts to reopen the waterway dampened by tit-for-tat demands by Iran and US President Trump for reparations.

Gold: +0.8%

• Extended on this month's advances after rallying above the USD 4,400/oz level with prices at a 2-month high.

Copper: +0.7%

• Joins in on the commodity-related advances but with further upside contained as its largest buyer, China, lags.

Oil rallies built on Strait of Hormuz disruption risk have a well-worn template: the initial move prices a supply outage that mostly does not materialise, and the premium then bleeds out unless flows through the waterway are actually interrupted, since roughly a fifth of seaborne crude transits the strait and the physical market, not the rhetoric, is the arbiter. The distinguishing variable across past episodes is whether the confrontation stays at the level of demands and signalling or touches shipping directly, via seizures, insurance repricing or war-risk premia, and the current reparations exchange sits firmly in the former camp, which historically caps follow-through absent a physical trigger. The fact that the move came on the absence of a deal to reopen the waterway, rather than on new escalation, fits the pattern of a premium defending itself rather than extending, and the next tells are freight and insurance rates on Gulf loadings and any change in tanker behaviour. Gold pushing to a two-month high alongside oil is the standard geopolitical pairing, with real-rate direction and the dollar the cross-checks on how durable the bid is. Copper's muted participation, attributed to lagging Chinese demand, underlines the split between geopolitically driven barrels and growth-driven metals: without the largest buyer confirming, the industrial complex tends to fade the risk-asset read-across from an oil spike.