Will oil prices go up?

No one can say for sure where oil prices will go next. Many forces shape the market—but at the core, it’s still about supply and demand. When risks like a potential recession or war ramp up, oil prices can change direction quickly.

How oil prices translate to gas pump prices

When you buy gas at the pump, you’re covering more than the cost of crude oil. You’re also paying for every step in the process, including refineries, wholesalers, taxes, and the markup your local gas station adds.

Even so, crude oil has the biggest influence on what you pay, often making up more than half the cost per gallon. When oil prices jump, gas prices usually climb right along with them. But when oil falls, gas prices often slip much more slowly—a pattern sometimes called “rockets and feathers.”

The role of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve

If an emergency hits, the U.S. keeps a backup supply of crude oil called the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. It’s mainly there to protect energy security during crises, such as sanctions, catastrophic storm damage, even war. It can also help cushion the blow when supply shocks send prices soaring.

It’s not meant to solve long-term problems. Instead, it provides quick relief for consumers and helps keep vital parts of the economy moving, like essential industries, emergency services, and public transit.

How oil and natural gas prices are linked

Oil and natural gas are two of the world’s primary energy sources. A big change in oil prices can affect natural gas by extension. For example, if oil prices increase, some industries may swap natural gas for some segments of their operations where possible, which which increases demand for natural gas.

Historical performance of oil

When looking at how oil performs, two main benchmarks stand out:

• Brent crude oil is the main global oil benchmark.
• West Texas Intermediate (WTI) is the main benchmark of North America.

Of the two, Brent gives a better picture of global oil performance because it prices a large share of the world’s traded crude. It’s also the go-to for tracking oil’s historical trends. In fact, even the U.S. Energy Information Administration now relies on Brent as its primary reference in its Annual Energy Outlook.

If you look at the Brent benchmark over several decades, oil has been far from stable. It has experienced sharp rises tied to wars and supply cuts, along with steep drops linked to global recessions and oversupply (called a “glut”). For example:

• The early 1970s delivered the first major oil shock when the Middle East slashed exports and placed an embargo on the U.S. and others during the Yom Kippur War.
• Prices fell in the mid-1980s due to lower demand and an influx of non-OPEC oil producers joining the market.
• Prices surged again in 2008 as global demand grew, but then crashed alongside the global financial crisis.
• During the 2020 COVID lockdown, oil demand plummeted like never before—pushing prices below $20 per barrel.

To sum up, oil’s historical performance has been anything but smooth. Again, it’s heavily influenced by wars, recessions, OPEC whims, shifting energy policies, and much more.

Looking to stay up-to-date regarding the latest energy developments? Check out our recent coverage:

Frequently asked questions

It’s easy to make predictions. Making correct predictions, on the other hand, is a lot harder.

One economic forecaster successfully predicted our current 4.2% inflation rate months ahead of time, well before even the Federal Reserve caught up.

Now that same gold-standard forecaster has issued updated predictions about what investors can expect in 2026 and beyond. Here’s what they said, and why we had better hope they’re wrong.

A proven winner

The forecaster is the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It’s an international agency that collects and standardizes economic data. It also provides policy analysis and what have often turned out to be eerily accurate economic projections. Small wonder that the U.S. State Department calls the OECD “one of the world’s largest and most reliable sources of statistical, economic, and social data.”

The OECD’s prediction of 4.2% inflation this year in the U.S. was an outlier when it came out in March. The Fed was only forecasting 2.7% inflation at the time. In early April, I said investors should pay attention to the OECD’s 4.2% forecast. If it was correct, I predicted:

You could almost certainly kiss any Fed interest rate cuts goodbye until at least 2027, as taming the runaway inflation would outweigh most other economic concerns. That would likely have a negative impact on the S&P 500 (^GSPC +1.18%), which is already reeling from rising energy costs.

Just last week, new Fed Chair Kevin Warsh essentially kissed any interest rate cuts goodbye until at least 2027, and the S&P 500 promptly dropped 1.6%. Sometimes I hate being right.

Well, earlier this month, the OECD released its updated mid-year economic outlook, and investors should definitely pay attention this time around.

Two possible scenarios

The first thing the OECD notes in its June Economic Outlook is, “The conflict in the Middle East has become the dominant force” on the global economy.

But the scope and duration of the conflict is still uncertain, which led the OECD to consider two possible scenarios. One is a “time-limited disruption” scenario, in which the situation is resolved quickly with no lasting impact on global commerce, such as tolls or closures in the Strait of Hormuz. The other is a “prolonged disruption” scenario, in which disruptions last “well into 2027” with longer-lasting consequences.

Image source: Getty Images.

Under the “time-limited” scenario, U.S. inflation is expected to come in at 3.7% for the year. That’s lower than May’s 4.2%, but don’t be misled. The 4.2% figure means that in May 2026, prices were 4.2% more expensive than in May 2025. But those same May 2026 prices are only 2.5% more expensive than they were in December 2025. The OECD’s 3.7% forecast is predicting that December 2026 prices will be 3.7% more expensive than in December 2025, meaning that even under this more optimistic scenario, we should expect an additional 1.2 percentage points of inflation by the end of the year.

The “prolonged” scenario is much worse.

Long-term pain

In the “prolonged” scenario, 2026 inflation rises to 4.1%, meaning we’d see an additional 1.6 percentage points of inflation between now and December. Then, 2027 inflation would rise to 4.2%. In other words, we’d have two years of 4%-plus inflation, led primarily by higher energy prices. That wouldn’t be good for the U.S. economy or the stock market.

The OECD notes that the U.S. economy was resilient in early 2026 “despite a succession of adverse shocks, including higher tariffs, tighter immigration policies, and a contraction in the federal workforce.” Therefore, GDP growth is still expected under the “time-limited” scenario, although at an anemic 2% in 2026 and 1.8% in 2027.

But under the “prolonged” scenario, GDP growth drops to 1.4% in 2026 and just 0.6% in 2027. That kind of weak growth could lead to other problems, like mass layoffs, lower business capital investment, and rising debt levels.

The takeaway here is that investors should keep abreast of how events in the Middle East are unfolding, since they will have the largest impact on the market’s near-term performance. If no progress appears to be made toward a resolution, investors may want to prioritize investments that thrive in a lower-growth environment. However, trying to sell and time the market is a bad idea, since history shows that investors who stay in the stock market nearly always come out on top.