Global oil reserves at their lowest since 2003 as Strait of Hormuz closure drains stockpiles, warns report

Published 10 June 2026 · finance

Oil reserves held by the world's 38 wealthiest nations have dropped to their lowest level since 2003, with global inventories draining at a record pace

Oil reserves held by the world's 38 wealthiest nations have dropped to their lowest level since 2003, with global inventories draining at a record pace as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz cuts off Middle Eastern crude and forces the United States into the role of emergency supplier for global markets, the US Energy Information Administration reported on Tuesday (9 June). OECD stocks at a 23-year low Inventories across the 38 nations of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, which include the US, Canada, Japan, France, the United Kingdom and South Korea, have fallen to levels not seen since 2003, according to USEIA data. Also Read | Crude oil prices rise after US launches strikes against Iran The drawdown is accelerating: global oil inventories are projected to decline by 6.3 million barrels per day in the current quarter, followed by a further 7.66 million barrels per day in the third quarter, according to EIA data. The Hormuz factor The immediate driver is the continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which a significant share of the world's oil exports typically flows. The Strait carried roughly 20 million barrels per day of oil and petroleum products in 2025, equivalent to about 25% of global seaborne oil trade and one-fifth of total global consumption.

That flow has since collapsed. Throughput fell by nearly 6 million barrels per day in the first quarter of 2026 to 14.6 million barrels per day, down almost 30% compared with the same period a year earlier and against 20.7 million barrels per day in the fourth quarter of 2025, according to EIA data. Three-quarters of Hormuz crude was shipped to Asia before the conflict began, with China and India accounting for 44% of total exports through the strait. Alternative routes exist but fall well short of plugging the gap. Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline has a stated capacity of 7 million barrels per day, while the UAE's Habshan-Fujairah pipeline can carry up to 1.8 million barrels per day. Together, the IEA estimates available alternative export capacity at only 3.5 to 5.5 million barrels per day, a fraction of what the strait previously handled. The scale of the shortfall prompted the IEA to announce a coordinated release of 400 million barrels from member countries' emergency stocks on 11 March 2026, the largest in the organisation's history. Member nations held more than 1.2 billion barrels in public emergency stocks at the time, alongside around 600 million barrels of industry stocks held under government obligation. LSE India's four-day problem Consultancy EY has warned that India's strategic crude oil inventories are sufficient for only 4 to 5 days of domestic consumption, leaving the country acutely exposed to supply shocks now roiling global markets.