Shipping chokepoints under pressure

The world’s busiest shortcuts are under pressure again, with the Strait of Hormuz exposed to coercion and the Panama Canal back on El Niño watch. (eia.gov) The Strait of Hormuz carries about 20 million barrels of oil a day, equal to roughly one-fifth of global petroleum liquids consumption, and about one-fifth of global liquefied natural gas trade also passes through it. The U.S. Energy Information Administration said in June 2025 that few practical alternatives exist if traffic is disrupted. (eia.gov 1) (eia.gov 2) Reporting in late March described Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps operating a de facto paid-passage system in Hormuz as commercial traffic slowed to a trickle. Lloyd’s List Intelligence, cited by Reuters and U.S. News, said the regime amounted to a “toll booth” on a route used by tankers, gas carriers, and bulk ships. (usnews.com) (foreignpolicy.com) On the other side of the globe, the Panama Canal is a freshwater lock system, which means ships need stored rainwater to be lifted up and lowered down between oceans. When drought cuts the lakes that feed the locks, the canal authority cuts the number of daily transits and raises or changes booking rules. (pancanal.com) (unctad.org) The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said on April 9, 2026, that El Niño is likely to emerge in May-to-July 2026 with a 61 percent chance and that the range of outcomes for late 2026 runs from neutral conditions to a very strong event. That forecast has put canal rainfall risk back into shipping models after the drought crisis of 2023 and 2024. (cpc.ncep.noaa.gov) The Panama Canal Authority has restored operations from the worst of the drought, but the system is still being actively managed. Its 2026 shipping advisories show continued changes to booking rules, and an April 2026 lane outage at Gatun Locks temporarily reduced available Panamax slots to 16. (pancanal.com 1) (pancanal.com 2) These risks are landing on a network that has already been stretched by attacks in the Red Sea and war-related disruption in the Black Sea. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development said in February 2024 that simultaneous shocks had pushed transits in both the Suez and Panama canals down by more than 40 percent from their peaks. (unctad.org) For cargo owners, the practical issue is not only closure but uncertainty: a ship can pay more for passage, wait longer for a slot, reroute around Africa, or miss delivery windows entirely. For energy markets, even the threat of disruption in Hormuz has moved prices before any full blockade took hold. (eia.gov) (unctad.org) That leaves global trade watching two narrow waterways for different reasons at the same time: one for armed pressure, the other for rain. Neither chokepoint needs to shut completely to scramble schedules, freight costs, and fuel flows. (eia.gov) (cpc.ncep.noaa.gov)