Brent crude briefly crossed $94 a barrel on Thursday after President Donald Trump declared the United States has no need for a deal with Iran, erasing earlier losses in a single session.

The January Brent contract was up 1.1% at $93.78 as of 8:28 a.m. ET, after rising as much as 1.8% in London trading. West Texas Intermediate futures (the U.S. crude benchmark) climbed 1.3% to $87.62 a barrel. The reversal came within hours.

What did Trump actually say?

Trump posted on Truth Social that bargaining with Tehran belongs to the past. "We don't need a deal with Iran. Those days have long since passed. We've got their money, Hundreds of Billions of Dollars, and we've got their Strait!" he wrote.

The reference to the Strait is the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow Persian Gulf chokepoint through which a large share of the world's seaborne oil passes. Control of it, in Trump's framing, removes any U.S. incentive to negotiate.

The post revived a specific fear. According to CNBC, traders read it as a sign the U.S.-Iran war may grind on with no resolution in sight — and repriced risk accordingly.

Why had prices been falling before the post?

Before Trump's message landed, crude was sliding for a simple reason: supply from the Persian Gulf was holding up better than expected.

• Saudi Arabia told OPEC that its output climbed 26% in October, one of its highest monthly totals in years, according to Bloomberg.
• Iraq said its production hit a wartime peak, Bloomberg reported.

More barrels flowing means less scarcity premium. That logic had been pulling prices down until the president's post interrupted it.

Where does Iran stand?

Tehran isn't blinking either. Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, said the country will not send "a single atom" of its enriched nuclear stockpile abroad, according to Bloomberg.

That's a reference to Iran's enriched uranium — material processed to a level usable in nuclear reactors or, at higher enrichment, weapons. Refusing to ship it out closes off one of the classic bargaining chips in nuclear diplomacy. Both sides, in effect, just told the market there's no deal coming.

How volatile has this market been?

The week alone shows the whiplash:

• On Sunday, Trump said additional U.S. strikes on Iran were improbable while negotiations to wind down the war advanced. Brent fell below $100 a barrel on Monday.
• On Oct. 8, Brent rose 4% to around $104 a barrel after Trump said he did not want a deal with Iran to end the war. A tanker attack in the Persian Gulf coincided with that jump.

Thursday's swing fits the pattern. A single post moves crude by more than a percentage point. A week-old peace signal wipes out several dollars. Traders aren't pricing oil fundamentals so much as parsing the president's feed.

The Gulf producers, meanwhile, keep pumping. Saudi output up 26% in October, Iraqi production at a wartime high — ample supply that would normally cap prices. What keeps crude elevated is the risk that the war, and the rhetoric around it, escalates faster than barrels can replace each other.

For now, the market's working assumption is simple: no deal, no ceasefire, and a Strait that stays contested. That assumption alone was worth roughly $1.50 on a barrel Thursday morning.