The Real Threat From The Iran War Hits Farmers, Not Fuel Pumps Authored by Michael Wilkerson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), Prices for retail diesel and gas have each risen by over a third ($1.30+ and $1.00 per gallon, respectively) since the launch of Epic Fury . Americans learned in the 1970s that Middle East conflict means energy pain, and that lesson has been reinforced through every sub...
The Real Threat From The Iran War Hits Farmers, Not Fuel Pumps Authored by Michael Wilkerson via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours), Prices for retail diesel and gas have each risen by over a third ($1.30+ and $1.00 per gallon, respectively) since the launch of Epic Fury . Americans learned in the 1970s that Middle East conflict means energy pain, and that lesson has been reinforced through every subsequent Gulf crisis. This time, however, the more consequential threat to American household budgets is not the fuel pump . It is quietly moving through the global fertilizer supply chain, and it will impact hundreds of millions of Americans who depend on the food that comes out of the ground each fall. Oil tankers and high speed crafts sit anchored at Muscat Anchorage near the Strait of Hormuz, in Muscat, Oman, on March 30, 2026. Elke Scholiers/Getty Images The distinction between fuel and food inflation matters. America’s position in the natural gas market—specifically liquefied natural gas (LNG), the fuel at the center of this conflict—is stronger than it was even a few years ago. The United States is now the world’s largest LNG exporter. Our domestic production runs at over 109 billion cubic feet per day. Our export terminals are running near full capacity. As substantial portions of Qatar’s Ras Laffan complex have been taken offline and the Strait of Hormuz has been effectively closed to tanker traffic, European gas benchmarks have surged more than 60 percent and Asian spot prices have nearly doubled . The American benchmark, Henry Hub, has barely moved. The Energy Information Administration expects it to average around $3.80 per million BTU for 2026—roughly where it was before the war began. The paradox of being the world’s largest LNG producer is that we cannot easily move our gas to the global market when terminals are already at capacity, which means that global gas scarcity does not drain our domestic supply. On natural gas, the moat holds. The story on fertilizer...
Dividend investors often place too much emphasis on a stock's dividend yield. While that's understandable to some degree, it can lead you into troubling waters if you aren't careful. AGNC Investment 's (NASDAQ: AGNC) 14% yield is an example of the issue. Here's what you need to know, including the company's regular reporting of what the business is really worth. AGNC Investment is a mortgage real ...
Dividend investors often place too much emphasis on a stock's dividend yield. While that's understandable to some degree, it can lead you into troubling waters if you aren't careful. AGNC Investment 's (NASDAQ: AGNC) 14% yield is an example of the issue. Here's what you need to know, including the company's regular reporting of what the business is really worth. AGNC Investment is a mortgage real estate investment trust (REIT). It oversees a portfolio of bond-like securities that are created by pooling individual mortgages. In this way, it operates a bit like a mutual fund. Which is interesting because mutual funds report the value of their portfolio, known as net asset value (NAV), on a daily basis. AGNC Investment reports its tangible net book value every quarter, which is roughly similar to NAV. Image source: Getty Images. Continue reading
The Orion spacecraft is now much closer to the Moon than Earth on its 10-day journey into deep space and back, and overall everything is going smashingly well. Things are going so well that, during the daily mission briefings at Johnson Space Center in Houston, there's just not that much of substance to talk about. So the discourse keeps coming back to, of all things, the toilet on board Orion. As...
The Orion spacecraft is now much closer to the Moon than Earth on its 10-day journey into deep space and back, and overall everything is going smashingly well. Things are going so well that, during the daily mission briefings at Johnson Space Center in Houston, there's just not that much of substance to talk about. So the discourse keeps coming back to, of all things, the toilet on board Orion. As you may recall, there were some toilet problems in the initial hours of the mission. During the initial checkout of spacecraft systems, Orion's toilet was supposed to be “wetted” with water to prime the pump. Not enough water was introduced, so the pump was non-responsive. Once more water was added, it began functioning fine. Read full article Comments
Javier Ruiz/iStock via Getty Images Emirates Global Aluminium, the Middle East’s biggest aluminum producer, said Friday it may take as long as a year to restore full output at its Al Taweelah site after sustaining significant damage in an Iranian missile and drone strike a week ago. EGA said it has completed an initial damage assessment of the facilities at the site in Abu Dhabi and is in contact ...
Javier Ruiz/iStock via Getty Images Emirates Global Aluminium, the Middle East’s biggest aluminum producer, said Friday it may take as long as a year to restore full output at its Al Taweelah site after sustaining significant damage in an Iranian missile and drone strike a week ago. EGA said it has completed an initial damage assessment of the facilities at the site in Abu Dhabi and is in contact with customers whose shipments may be impacted Al Taweelah is one of the world's biggest smelters, producing 1.6M tons of cast metal in 2025; EGA said other facilities at the site, including an alumina refinery and a metals recycling plant, could resume some production earlier, pending a final damage assessment. The Middle East accounts for ~9% of global aluminum production, but the impact of the Iran war is compounded because constraints on output elsewhere have eroded inventories , leaving the market with little buffer to cushion any shocks. Aluminum prices ( LMAHDS03:COM ) have jumped more than 10% on the London Metal Exchange since the start of the war. Potentially relevant stocks include Alcoa ( AA ), Century Aluminum ( CENX ), Kaiser Aluminum ( KALU ), Constellium ( CSTM ), Rio Tinto ( RIO ), BHP ( BHP ). More on Alcoa, Century Aluminum, and aluminum futures Alcoa Has A Lot Going For It That Justifies Further Upside Century Aluminum: A High Stakes Strait Of Hormuz Hedge Commodities: Oil Jumps Amid Trump's Escalation Warning
Robert Fico said ending sanctions on Russian energy imports would help tackle the energy crisis stemming from the war in Iran. What we know on day 1,502 Slovakia’s prime minister Robert Fico has called on the European Union to end sanctions on Russian oil and gas imports in order to tackle the energy crisis stemming from the war in Iran . Fico said in a statement after a call with Hungarian prime ...
Robert Fico said ending sanctions on Russian energy imports would help tackle the energy crisis stemming from the war in Iran. What we know on day 1,502 Slovakia’s prime minister Robert Fico has called on the European Union to end sanctions on Russian oil and gas imports in order to tackle the energy crisis stemming from the war in Iran . Fico said in a statement after a call with Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán that the EU should renew dialogue with Russia so member states can get missing gas and oil supplies from all sources, including Russia. Hungary and Slovakia’s leaders are outliers in the EU for maintaining relations with Moscow. Oil prices have surged since the US and Israel launched their war on Iran on 28 February, holding up shipments from the Gulf and creating what the International Energy Agency has called the biggest oil supply disruption in history. Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced greater security cooperation with Turkey after meeting his counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Istanbul on Saturday , as Kyiv seeks to leverage its wartime knowhow on the international stage. “This applies above all to the areas in which we can support Turkey: expertise, technology and experience,” the Ukrainian president wrote on Telegram. Erdogan told Zelenskyy that Turkey would continue to support negotiations between Ukraine and Russia to end their war, the Turkish presidency said. US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner could travel to Kyiv in April , the Ukrainian president’s top aide Kyrylo Budanov has said, amid efforts to revive peace talks with Russia which stalled after the outbreak of war in the Gulf. “Kushner, Witkoff, Lindsey Graham – those are the ones expected to come. Who else will be there, we’ll see,” Budanov told Bloomberg, adding that the meeting could take place shortly after Orthodox Easter on 12 April. Such a meeting would mark the first official visit to Kyiv for Witkoff and Kushner, who have previously met Ukrainian representatives in the US, ...
A dawn gloom hangs over the pier in Bangsaray, eastern Thailand, as buyers arrive to wait for the first fishing boats to return. But like everyone else relying on the day’s catch they have already lost money to someone else’s war. Thailand’s multibillion-dollar fishing industry has been brought to its knees by the runaway price of diesel, a result of Iran’s throttling of the Strait of Hormuz in re...
A dawn gloom hangs over the pier in Bangsaray, eastern Thailand, as buyers arrive to wait for the first fishing boats to return. But like everyone else relying on the day’s catch they have already lost money to someone else’s war. Thailand’s multibillion-dollar fishing industry has been brought to its knees by the runaway price of diesel, a result of Iran’s throttling of the Strait of Hormuz in response to the US and Israel’s attacks. Half of the kingdom’s vast fishing fleet is already docked,...