TOKYO, March 9 — Stock markets in South Korea and Japan fell sharply in early trade on Monday after oil prices soared above US$100 per barrel for the first time in almost four years.
South Korea’s Kospi was down 6.7 per cent while the Nikkei 225 in Tokyo was off around 5.8 per cent, after trading more than six per cent lower earlier in the session.
West Texas Intermediate (WTI), the main US oil benchmark, was trading at US$106.80 per barrel, up 17.4 per cent.
Brent Crude was up 15.65 per cent at US$107.20 per barrel.
Both touched levels not seen since the early months of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
US President Donald Trump dismissed the spike as a “small price to pay” to eliminate Iran’s nuclear threat, reiterating the White House’s insistence that the rise is temporary.
“Short term oil prices, which will drop rapidly when the destruction of the Iran nuclear threat is over, is a very small price to pay for U.S.A., and World, Safety and Peace,” he wrote on social media Sunday evening Washington time.
“ONLY FOOLS WOULD THINK DIFFERENTLY!” he argued.
Maritime traffic in the Strait of Hormuz—through which 20 percent of global crude and gas passes—has all but halted since the war began on February 28.
Japan, the world’s fourth-largest economy, is also the fifth-biggest importer of crude, with some 95 percent from the Middle East and around 70 percent of passing through the Strait of Hormuz before the conflict.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said on March 2 that Japan holds emergency oil reserves equivalent to 254 days of domestic consumption.
Kyodo News reported on Friday, citing an unnamed source, that the Japanese government was considering releasing some of its oil reserves.
South Korea is the world’s fourth-largest importer of crude. The biggest is China. — AFP
