Gas prices in Texas and elsewhere in the United States have jumped an average 7 cents in recent days after Iran threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz through which 16 million barrels of oil about a fifth of world's daily oil trade passes every day.
Motor club and leisure travel organization serving North America AAA said analysts believe gasoline prices have gone up due to strained relations between the US and Iran.

Iran could close the Strait of Hormuz, which is just 45 kilometers wide at its narrowest point and works as a crucial waterway connecting the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman, in the event of a military strike or severe tightening of international sanctions on its oil exports.

Mr Kent Moors Editor of Oil Energy Investor and Author of the new book The Vega Factor said that the talk of a possible closure is driving up prices. The market now has been govern for some time by futures contracts which means that the contracts that people are buying and selling for future deliveries of oil upwards to 6 months out. We now are into oil brinkmanship. Oil brinkmanship is unstable, it's unpredictable and it's extremely risky.

(Sourced from www.tehrantimes.com)