Iran Strikes Another Tanker as Shipping Rates Hit $1 Million a Day and China Presses Tehran on Hormuz

Another Tanker Hit, Rates Blow Past $1 Million

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps says it struck the Togo-flagged tanker Trend late Thursday as the vessel tried to cross the Strait of Hormuz. IRGC Admiral Ali Ozmaei told the state-linked outlet Tasnim News the ship caught fire and was stopped, and warned that any unauthorized passage "will have no outcome other than the destruction of the offending vessel," according to the Epoch Times.

The Associated Press could not immediately confirm Iran's account, a caveat AsiaOne included in its report but that did not appear in the Epoch Times version. The UK Maritime Trade Operations agency separately confirmed a different tanker was struck Wednesday by an "unknown projectile" while exiting the strait, with the crew reported safe. Between the two incidents, at least three ships have been hit in the waterway over roughly 48 hours, per the UK agency.

The attacks are landing on a shipping market already stretched to its limit. The cost to hire a tanker hauling crude from the Persian Gulf to China hit $1.035 million a day this week, the first time the industry's benchmark route has topped seven figures, according to Baltic Exchange data reported by Bloomberg via gCaptain and The Business Times. A comparable run normally costs around $208,000 a day. Even the safer Gulf of Oman route, which skips the strait entirely, now runs about $644,000 a day.

Vortexa's principal freight analyst, Ioannis Papadimitriou, told Fortune the price spike is pure risk pricing. Insurance premiums on vessels crossing Hormuz have jumped to roughly 10% of a ship's value, up from 0.5% to 1% before the war. Kpler data cited by The Business Times showed just four commodity vessels transiting Hormuz on Monday, down from ten the day before, though some ships may be crossing with transponders switched off to avoid detection.

China Leans on Iran

Behind the scenes, Beijing has been pushing Tehran to pull back. Reuters, citing three Iranian sources and reported here via Breitbart, says Saudi Arabia asked China to help push back against Houthi attacks, and China in turn asked Iran to rein in the group before the conflict spreads further and threatens the oil China needs. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi reportedly delivered the message when Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi visited Beijing this week, publicly urging Iran to reopen the strait and return to the U.S.-Iran memorandum brokered by Pakistan in June.

Iran's response, per the Iranian sources, was to blame the U.S. and Israel for regional hostilities rather than commit to anything. China's foreign ministry, asked for comment by Reuters, said only that "escalating regional instability is not in the interests of any party." China has its own stake here. It depends heavily on Gulf oil and has no interest in a wider war choking off supply, a motive worth weighing against any framing of Beijing as a neutral peacemaker.

Tehran Rallies, Trump Weighs His Options

Inside Iran, the government staged its largest show of public support since the war began, with hundreds of thousands filling Tehran's streets, some trampling U.S. and Israeli flags and chanting "Death to America," according to AsiaOne. State media framed the crowd as "Janfaday-e Iran" — those willing to sacrifice their lives for the country — even as the economy strains under the U.S. naval blockade and fresh sanctions.

U.S. Central Command says 104 ships have been redirected to comply with that blockade. Treasury sanctioned a financial institution called BitBank on Thursday under its "Operation Economic Outcast" campaign. President Trump, in comments to Axios's Barak Ravid, said he's satisfied with the blockade's effect. "Not one ship has gone to Iran since we started," he said, but is still weighing whether to go further: "Do I want to go in and annihilate them or do I not? It's a big decision."

Critics of the blockade approach could reasonably argue that squeezing global shipping this hard, with rates and insurance costs this distorted, is inflicting real economic pain on countries with no stake in the conflict, not just on Iran. The administration's counter, laid out by Trump himself, is that the blockade is working exactly as intended by cutting off Iranian oil revenue without another round of U.S. strikes.

Separately, U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright told Bloomberg Television Monday that Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline, closed after drone attacks last week, should be running again "soon," though he offered no firm date. Whether that timeline holds, and whether China's private pressure on Tehran produces any pullback from the Houthis, remain open questions heading into the weekend.