[MARKET ANALYSIS] Oil prices rallied to start the week with Saudi's East-West Pipeline shut following attacks, while Oman postponed a planned Persian Gulf Foreign Ministers meeting where Iran was set to formally unveil a temporary Hormuz agreement

Pipeline shutdowns on Saudi Arabia's East-West route are among the more material supply disruptions the market prices, because that line is precisely the redundancy designed to bypass Hormuz; with it closed, the Kingdom's ability to reroute exports around a strait closure is impaired at the same time as strait risk itself is elevated, so the two hedges fail together. Episodes of this kind have tended to price a geopolitical premium first into prompt Brent and the front of the curve, steepening backwardation, with the durability of that premium hinging on whether flows actually halt rather than merely face threatened. The postponed Oman meeting matters on the other side: back-channel formats involving Iran have historically been the venue where de-escalation on shipping lanes gets signalled, and a delay removes the near-term catalyst for unwinding the risk premium. Freight rates, war-risk insurance quotes and tanker fixtures through the strait are the usual tells for whether disruption is pricing or actually occurring. The calendar complication is the mid-week FOMC and other central bank decisions, which cap the metals complex, with gold consolidating after the post-CPI whipsaw and copper trading off the demand side rather than the supply shock, the classic split between energy and industrial metals in a supply-driven crude rally. As a wire summary rather than new information, the note is a snapshot of positioning into an event-heavy week.