Middle East conflict redraws global gas trade map in International Shipping News 05/05/2026 T he fragile equilibrium of the global natural gas market – which had spent much of the early 2025/2026 heating season trending toward stability – has been shattered by the geopolitical eruption in the Middle East. According to the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) Gas Market Report, Q2-2026, a series of unprecedented disruptions—top of which is the de facto closure of the Strait of Hormuz—has altered the trajectory of international energy trade. What was once anticipated as a year of easing fundamentals and “strong LNG supply growth” has instead devolved into a period of “unprecedented uncertainty” that threatens to delay the next global LNG wave by at least two years, the IEA said. Decreased volumes are just part of the picture; it’s the total restructuring of supply routes and the re-emergence of extreme price volatility that brokers and charterers need to take note of. The report states that “the loss, for the time being, of almost 20% of global LNG supply has caused strong price volatility, driving up natural gas prices in both Asia and Europe to their highest levels since the 2022/23 energy crisis”. For trade partners and industrial consumers, the implications of this is that the era of predictable, softening prices seen in late 2025 has ended, replaced by a “major supply shock to regional and global gas markets”, according to the IEA. Hormuz bottleneck The Strait of Hormuz serves as the world’s most critical artery for liquefied natural gas. In 2025, approximately 110 billion cubic meters (bcm) of LNG—nearly 20% of global trade—transited this waterway, according to IEA figures. However, the effective closure of the strait in March essentially “reduced the combined LNG production of Qatar and the United Arab Emirates by close to 10 bcm for the month”. The IEA notes that while global deliveries initially fell by only 2% in March due to shipping lag times, the “full imp