US Officials and Commercial Trackers Disagree on Strait of Hormuz Oil

The United States government and independent commercial ship trackers reported conflicting figures regarding daily oil volumes passing through the Strait of Hormuz amid ongoing military-escorted covert shipping operations in the region.

Data released by the Trump administration indicated that substantial crude volumes continue to flow out of the Persian Gulf despite ongoing regional conflicts. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said last week the U.S. military had helped ship over 15 million barrels of crude and oil products out of the waterway last Tuesday. He put the average oil exports through the strait over a seven-day period at more than 8 million barrels a day. Earlier this month, Wright said the seven-day average stood at around 9 million barrels a day.

However, commercial maritime tracking services reported vastly lower shipment numbers, placing estimates between 2 million and 6 million barrels daily. The divergence stems from Middle Eastern oil producers chartering vessels to conduct "dark" transits by switching off their AIS transponders to evade Iranian drone strikes. According to tracking firm Kpler, approximately 80% of maritime traffic through the narrow 23-mile waterway has turned off transponders over recent weeks.

The covert movement strategy relies on naval escorts and nighttime passages through the strait into the Gulf of Oman, where vessels conduct ship-to-ship transfers to commercial customer tankers. Satellite imagery confirmed the Greek-owned supertanker Kiku turned off its transponder on July 31 near Dubai before reappearing on August 1 off Fujairah to perform a week-long crude transfer with another supertanker, the Nave Electron, which subsequently departed for Ningbo, China.

To mitigate reliance on the vulnerable strait, Middle Eastern suppliers have activated alternative logistics routes. Saudi Arabia has diverted approximately 5 million barrels per day through its East-West pipeline to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, while regional producers routed another 2 million barrels per day around the waterway. International crude suppliers including Brazil, Guyana, and Venezuela have additionally expanded output by over 1 million barrels per day to alleviate global supply strains.