Gas prices reached the highest-ever level for this time of year on Wednesday, according to fuel rate tracker GasBuddy.
Patrick De Haan, the head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, announced in a social media post that the national average price of gasoline has never hit more than $4 a gallon after Aug. 12 in any previous year.
The average price of fuel was sitting just over that mark Wednesday morning. Fuel prices did come close to setting a record four years ago, with the national average price of gas sitting around $3.98 a gallon on this day in 2022.
This news follows months of turbulence in the oil markets amid the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz during the ongoing Iran war. Around 20 percent of the world’s oil consumption flows through the strait on a daily basis, and it has been closed because of intermittent strikes and a U.S. naval blockade in the waterway.
Iran and Oman said last week they were nearing an agreement to reopen the critical trading route.
On Saturday, a top Iranian official laid out the country’s demands for the U.S. in negotiations to reopen the strait, including ending the naval blockade, lifting sanctions on Iran and requiring the U.S. to pay war reparations.
President Trump responded to Iran’s list by demanding that the country provide compensation “for all the people that they have killed and gravely wounded with their roadside bombs and many conflicts.”
On Wednesday morning, Trump doubled down on his administration’s opposition to Tehran’s requests, writing on Truth Social that the U.S. “has total control over the Strait of Hormuz.”
“I THINK WE WILL KEEP IT!” he continued. “Our Naval Blockade is being called, by everyone, ‘A WALL OF STEEL,’ and there is nothing Iran can do about it.”
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