How Iran's war is redrawing global oil flows and who actually wins

The paradox of profitable disruption

Six months into the war on Iran, the largest US oil companies have posted their biggest profits since 2022. They are selling less oil at far higher prices. Brent crude has climbed roughly 22 percent — from $72 to $88 a barrel — since the conflict began on February 28. But this profitability comes with a growing tension that English-language coverage has largely missed: the very investments these companies built over decades are now sitting in the crosshairs.

The real story isn’t the price spike. It is the restructuring of who controls what, and who gets left holding the bag when infrastructure lies in rubble.

The chokepoint that won’t unchoke

Before the war, one-fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas passed through the Strait of Hormuz. It now remains largely closed to commercial traffic. Iran and Oman agreed to a temporary maritime route last week, but Iran has made full reopening conditional on the United States fulfilling commitments under a lapsed interim peace deal. That leaves a fundamental uncertainty hanging over every project, contract, and balance sheet dependent on Gulf supply routes.

Rahul Choudhary at Rystad Energy puts it plainly: US companies’ share of gas supplies from the region is expected to fall by around 40 percent this year compared to last year, and oil supplies will drop by 30 to 35 percent. Less volume. Higher prices. The math works — until it doesn’t.

The divide: who’s exposed and who isn’t

The impact has not been distributed evenly. It has carved a clear line between companies with Gulf assets and those without.

Chevron has limited exposure to Arab Gulf supply disruptions — the region accounts for just 5 percent of its total global output. That isolation bought it a $12 billion adjusted earnings report on July 31, its highest quarterly profit in six years. Chevron is also quietly exploring routes to move Iraqi crude to Mediterranean export terminals, a potential workaround that would reduce long-term dependence on the Strait.

ExxonMobil tells a different story. The closure of Hormuz and Iranian attacks on US-linked infrastructure have hit its operations in Qatar and the UAE hard. These markets together account for 20 percent of ExxonMobil’s global equity upstream supply. In the first half of 2026 alone, the company’s upstream earnings dropped by roughly $1.3 billion compared to the same period last year due to lower volumes from the Middle East. Higher commodity prices covered the shortfall — for now.

But the numbers getting worse. ExxonMobil’s share of LNG supply from Qatar is expected to fall to about 4 million tonnes this year, down from 13 million tonnes last year. ConocoPhillips, another major Qatar player, is seeing its volumes drop from 2.5 million tonnes to just 1 million tonnes. The gap between these two trajectories will define which companies survive this conflict and which emerge structurally weaker.

The physical damage: mapping the strikes

According to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data project, Iran and Iran-backed groups have carried out at least 172 attacks on nonmilitary infrastructure across the six GCC countries since February 28. Nearly half — 48 percent — targeted energy facilities, power plants, and desalination plants.

The list of hits reads like a map of Western energy entanglement in the Gulf:

• Kuwait’s Mina Abdullah and Mina al-Ahmadi refineries
• The Bahrain Petroleum Company oil refinery
• ADNOC’s al-Ruwais Industrial City and the Habshan gas complex
• Multiple Saudi Aramco facilities, including a drone strike on July 27 on the Abqaiq processing complex, which handles more than 7 million barrels per day
• Qatar’s Ras Laffan Industrial City, the world’s largest LNG export hub, which hosted joint ventures between QatarEnergy, ExxonMobil, and ConocoPhillips

The damage to Qatar’s LNG infrastructure may be the most consequential. An explosion on the Barzan gas project in June killed at least 13 people. Damaged LNG trains at Rasgas have destroyed roughly 13 million tonnes of capacity. QatarEnergy says repair will take three to five years and cost around $3 billion. Those lost tonnes represent years of delayed supply growth in a market where every million tonnes of LNG matters.

The strategic question: who wins when supply tightens?

Higher prices benefit producers. They also punish consumers and slow the energy transition by keeping fossil fuels artificially competitive. But the more immediate question is corporate: which companies’ balance sheets absorb the shock and which ones get hollowed out?

Chevron and Occidental Petroleum, whose operations sit in less volatile jurisdictions — Israel and Oman respectively — have faced fewer disruptions. Their regional exposure is either smaller or geographically分散. ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips, by contrast, have deep commitments in the most contested markets: Qatar’s North Field expansion and the UAE’s Upper Zakum offshore field.

ExxonMobil’s $10 billion Upper Zakum and Qatar LNG expansions now face delays. ConocoPhillips remains exposed through its planned 42 percent stake in BP’s Kirkuk operations in Iraq — a market where a drone attack on the Sarsang oilfield in March and an explosion at a storage facility in April already caused significant damage.

The service companies caught in between

US oilfield services giants — SLB, Halliburton, and Baker Hughes — occupy an ambiguous position. They provide drilling technology and operational expertise across the Gulf but do not own the wells. Their revenues from the Middle East fell 8 to 10 percent in the second quarter compared to the previous year, according to Rystad’s Chinmayi Teggi. Higher oil prices lifted margins elsewhere, partially offsetting the regional decline.

The outlook hinges on a recovery in suspended operations and production. If that materializes, these companies could see growth into 2027. If the conflict drags on, the revenue gap widens and project pipelines thin.

What comes next

The Strait of Hormuz will not reopen on schedule. Iran controls the terms, and those terms remain tied to a peace deal that no longer exists in any enforceable form. Until it does, Gulf energy infrastructure will remain a target, supply will remain constrained, and prices will stay elevated.

For investors, the takeaway is blunt: Gulf exposure is no longer a simple calculation of reserve size and cost per barrel. It is a geopolitical risk assessment. Companies with diversified geography — like Chevron — enjoy a structural advantage. Companies with concentrated commitments in high-risk states — like ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips in Qatar and the UAE — are carrying options that may expire worthless, or take years to recover.

The war has not just disrupted oil flows. It has redrawn the competitive map of the global energy sector. The winners will be those who survive the next six months. The losers are already writing off billions.