Key Summary

Kuwait Petroleum Corp has restored crude exports to roughly 1 million barrels per day, yet part of that volume is being moved via ship-to-ship transfers outside the Strait of Hormuz using KPC-owned and chartered tankers, so headline barrels overstate the degree of logistical normalization. The workaround channel raises freight and insurance costs per barrel and keeps a shipping-risk premium embedded in Brent and WTI even as physical supply holds up, while tanker rates and Gulf war-risk premiums stay the cleaner read on stress than export volumes alone. KPC international marketing executive Shaikh Khaled Al-Sabah told S&P Global's APPEC conference in Singapore that all customers can be supplied but some volumes are not the same as before; watch whether STS handling shrinks and Hormuz transit resumes normally, which would compress freight spreads and the crude risk premium.