MW The Iran conflict might take as long as the 2022 'oil shock' to blow over: TS Lombard

By Myra P. Saefong

The research firm is rethinking its previous prediction that the Iran conflict would be over by April

The Iran conflict, now in its third week, has disrupted shipping through the critical maritime passageway known as the Strait of Hormuz.

Returning to business as usual in the global oil market might now take months - not weeks - to achieve, according to TS Lombard.

That's the new forecast from Christopher Granville, a managing director and political researcher at the firm, who sees potential solutions to fully reopening the Strait Hormuz as likely to hit some serious snags.

In response to the U.S. and Israel's attacks, Iran made its move - establishing its Strait of Hormuz "lever," which allows it to export its own oil while blocking all other shipping at will, Granville wrote in a Wednesday client note.

But the power to reverse the resulting price shock to the oil market still rests with the U.S., he said. That would require free tanker passage through the strait, with President Donald Trump holding a number of options to achieve that goal. TS Lombard put together the below chart of potential options.

The most "market-friendly" scenario would be the U.S. getting leverage over Iran's oil export revenues and opening the way to normalized Persian Gulf shipping for everyone, said Granville.

A more likely scenario would be a "unilateral TACO," he said, using the acronym for "Trump Always Chickens Out" - an assumption that the president eventually reverses his policies if they have a negative effect on markets and the economy.

Trump earlier this week called on NATO allies to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but quickly pivoted when no offers of immediate help arrived. Trump then suggested the strait's closure was a problem mainly for others more dependent on oil imports than the U.S.

Granville expects Trump to spend the rest of this month "probing other options" before falling back on a unilateral TACO option.

Kharg Island, a critical hub for Iran's oil exports, could be a "swing factor" to finding a resolution. The U.S. said in recent days it had bombed military targets on the island, and threatened to strike vital oil-infrastructure sites next if Tehran didn't allow tankers to flow through the strait.

Given all the different scenarios and possible outcomes, TS Lombard said it was revising its base-case prediction of the war ending in a few weeks. The firm now sees higher odds of the "worst case of a 2022-style energy shock lasting half a year" playing out.

To that end, Granville's new base-case timeline sits somewhere between four to five weeks and the five months that it took for the 2022 oil shock to blow over.

Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, leading to a spike in global oil prices past $100 a barrel. May Brent crude (BRNK26) (BRN00) settled at $107.38 a barrel on Wednesday, up 48% month to date.

-Myra P. Saefong

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March 18, 2026 17:34 ET (21:34 GMT)

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