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Aramco chief warns world oil stockpiles are ‘scarily thin’

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The world’s oil stockpiles are “scarily thin” and could take up to two years to rebuild, Saudi Aramco chief executive Amin Nasser said on Monday, 5 October 2026, in a speech to the Energy Intelligence Forum conference in London, the Financial Times reported in a story carried by The Irish Times.

Three billion barrels lost

In his first public speech since the war began, Nasser said the seven-month conflict between the US, Israel and Iran had cut oil supply from the region by “nearly three billion barrels”, roughly half of the crude and refined fuels that would have passed through the Strait of Hormuz in that period.

More than one billion barrels have been drawn from reserves to soften the shortfall, he said. Governments have released more than 300 million barrels from strategic reserves and agreed on Friday to release more, but most of the oil drawn so far has come from company stocks, which Nasser called “the last major tool in the box”.

“The system is already straining,” he said. “And with precious little else the world can turn to, the supply resilience cushion is scarily thin.” He estimated that “less than six billion barrels of commercial inventories remain today, with the vast majority not practically available”.

Rebuilding oil stockpiles will take time

Nasser said that even after the conflict ends, “replenishing inventories while meeting demand could take up to two years”, and urged governments to focus more on energy security and resilience. He said Aramco was studying additional export routes for Saudi crude and exploring more overseas storage to protect customers from future disruptions.

He also warned that open data such as satellite imagery and shipping logs was “increasingly being weaponised against infrastructure and tankers”. “Tools of transparency should not become ammunition for aggression,” he said.

Flows recover, but at a cost

Shipments from Gulf countries rose to 15.5 million barrels a day last month, the highest since the war began and more than 80% of pre-conflict volumes, according to data provider Kpler. Those cargoes have been very expensive to move, however, and physical North Sea crude for October delivery has risen to its highest level since April.

Source: The Irish Times / Financial Times | Argus Media

Photo: Arabian American Oil Co. (Aramco) / Wikimedia Commons, public domain (resized)

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