The narrow waterway south of Iran is one of the world's most important trade arteries, through which a fifth of global oil and seaborne gas is shipped from production facilities and refineries in the Gulf to buyers around the world. The strait carries just over 20m barrels of oil a day, making it the busiest oil route after the strait of Malacca between Malaysia and Indonesia.
The Strait of Hormuz: The narrow waterway next to Iran is a choke point that handles a whopping one-fourth of the world's maritime oil trade and a fifth of liquefied natural gas shipments. Iran has previously threatened to close the strait. Still, "supply disruption to global markets would be limited even in the event that Iran retaliates against tanker traffic, given the expected US-led efforts to maintain supply through the Strait of Hormuz," Eurasia Group analysts wrote.