Brent Goes to the Moon, Briefly
Published 4 October 2026
If you want to start an argument among oil people, ask what the price of oil hit in April. You will get at least two answers, both correct, and the disagreement will last an hour.
Spot is a barrel, futures is a promise
The physical price of Brent crude, the oil you can actually buy for delivery, is measured daily by the US Energy Information Administration as a spot price. On Tuesday 7 April, the day the ceasefire was announced in Washington, that spot close was $138.21 a barrel, according to the EIA series. The traded futures contract, the one most people mean when they say "Brent", had its war high on Thursday 30 April, when the expiring June contract touched $126.41 and settled at $114.01, per Reuters. The more active July contract settled that day at $110.88.
These are different instruments. Futures roll from one expiry to the next, and the front month changes; physical prices carry premiums for prompt cargoes, which in a shortage can be large. Neither is wrong. This file keeps them in separate charts and never mixes them in a sentence without a label.
The physical range, month by month
The EIA table gives the lowest and highest daily close each month. February: $67.72 to $73.17. March: $77.24 to $126.69. April: $98.63 to $138.21. May: $92.88 to $118.26. June: $70.16 to $101.69. July: $68.53 to $105.32. August: $86.47 to $96.92. September, through the 29th: $96.02 to $130.80. The September high of $130.80 came on 15 September. There are no October observations yet.
The futures range
The FT and LSEG history of the continuous front-month contract gives intraday highs and lows. February: $65.19 to $73.00. March: $75.75 to $119.50. April: $86.09 to $126.41. May: $91.44 to $115.30. June: $71.38 to $98.99. July: $70.14 to $102.00. August: $78.11 to $94.83. September: $90.70 to $109.97. October, on two days only and one of them unfinished: $96.55 to $103.96. Treat October as provisional. The source page showed two conflicting clock labels, so its latest quote is not something to hang a claim on.
The milestones in between
A few settlements anchor the story, all from Reuters price reports. On 3 March Brent settled at $81.40, up 4.7%. On 2 April it settled at $109.03, up 7.78%, after the president vowed more attacks, per the report that day. By 30 June the expiring August contract settled at $72.92, with September near $73.31, and Brent had fallen about 21% in June after about 19% in May, the steepest monthly and quarterly losses since 2020. On 31 July it settled at $90.12, up about 24% for July, per Reuters.
Then September: Reuters asked on 8 September why oil was not above $100 despite the disruption, and the next day Brent did cross $100 for the first time since 24 July, reaching $100.95 intraday at the time of the report, per that story. Dated physical Brent had already been above $100 since 3 September. On Thursday 1 October the December future settled at $102.31.
The daily lines
The two daily series show the same war from different angles. The futures line is smoother and lower at the peaks. The physical line is more violent, because physical barrels in a shortage are bid up in a way that a deferred contract is not.
What the shape says, and does not
The charts make a tempting story: price spike, ceasefire, collapse, rebound. The story holds as a description of the price. It does not hold as a causal chain for every move, and nothing in this file claims that a particular headline moved a particular day's close, except where Reuters itself said so. The price was reacting to physical flows, to expectations of a deal, to rollovers, and to the sheer difficulty of getting cargoes through a strait. All of those moved at once.
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