Brent crude ended October at its highest level since late April, as traders weighed the risk of further disruption to Middle East oil supplies. The December Brent contract, which expired on Friday 30 October, settled at $117.64 a barrel, up $2.76 or 2.4 per cent on the day, after briefly touching $118. The more actively traded January contract settled at $113.43, up $2.63, while United States West Texas Intermediate crude finished at $104.12, up $2.12 or 2.08 per cent.

Why prices jumped on Friday

The immediate trigger reported by traders was an attack on a tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which a large share of Gulf oil exports pass, alongside renewed threats to Saudi energy infrastructure. Those incidents kept a risk premium in prices even as diplomatic efforts continued, with Qatari mediators in Tehran and indirect messages still passing between Washington and Iran. For the month as a whole, Brent rose 13.6 per cent and WTI gained 15.2 per cent, giving both benchmarks a fourth consecutive monthly advance.

What Sunday's OPEC+ meeting may decide

Attention now turns to Sunday 1 November, when seven core OPEC+ producers — Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, Kuwait, Algeria, Kazakhstan and Oman — meet online. Three people familiar with the discussions told Reuters on 27 October that the group is likely to keep its December production targets unchanged, although no final decision had been made at that point. The group completed the phased reversal of a 1.65 million barrel-per-day cut in September, but a further reduction of about 2 million barrels per day remains in place through the end of 2026, and actual Gulf output has run well below quotas because of wartime export disruption. A decision to hold targets steady would leave the stated levels in place without, by itself, guaranteeing how much oil reaches the market in December.