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The IEA says the world will burn 2.5 million barrels a day less this year and the Gulf is exporting a quarter of its diesel: what the September report actually says
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#IEA Oil Market Report#diesel prices#Brent crude#Strait of Hormuz#oil demand 2026#Pakistan fuel

The IEA says the world will burn 2.5 million barrels a day less this year and the Gulf is exporting a quarter of its diesel: what the September report actually says

Zohaib Masood

The International Energy Agency's September Oil Market Report, published on 11 September 2026, forecasts world oil demand falling by 2.5 million barrels a day this year and puts Gulf net diesel exports in August at 390,000 barrels a day, "just over a quarter of pre-war levels". Those are the two sentences that matter for an industrial buyer in Pakistan, and neither is the one the week's headlines ran with.

The headlines ran with the price: Brent above $100 for the first time in nearly four months. Yesterday's piece on this site, the cost sheet at Brent $107 and diesel Rs 398, dealt with what the price does to an invoice. This one is about volumes, because the IEA's report is a volume document, and because what it says about diesel is worse than what it says about crude. What follows is taken from the report's published highlights and its "Diesel squeeze" section. The full report is a paid subscription; where a figure is not on the public page, it is not here.

Bloomberg The Pulse title card with presenter Francine Lacqua
From Oil Inventories Falling at Record Pace, Warns IEA | The Pulse 05/13/2026 by Bloomberg Television, the May broadcast on the agency's earlier warning. Four months on, the draw the IEA warned about stands at 507 million barrels. Used as a research lead; the figures here are the agency's.

What the report says, line by line

The IEA's wording is precise and its numbers carry a comparison to the previous month's report, so both are worth setting out exactly.

ItemSeptember OMR figureAgainst the August reportThe IEA's own words
World oil demand, 2026−2.5 mb/d940 kb/d steeper"Losses will be concentrated in middle distillates and petrochemical feedstock products, especially in Asia"
Demand decline by quarter2Q −5.3, 3Q −3.4, 4Q −2.0 mb/d—"the pace of the decline is set to ease"
World oil demand, 2027+2.6 mb/d—"narrowly offsetting this year's losses"
Global production, August100.1 mb/d, −1.6 mb/d m/m—"more than 10 mb/d of Gulf output remained shut in"
World supply, 2026100.7 mb/d, −5.7 mb/d y/y1.3 mb/d lower"full recovery in supplies from Middle East producers deferred until 2027"
World supply, 2027+8 mb/d—Americas Quintet adds 1.4 mb/d in 2026, 1 mb/d in 2027
Refinery runs, August81.4 mb/d; −4.2 mb/d y/y—"losses spread across the Middle East, Russia and crude importing economies in Asia"
Observed inventories, August−95 mb (3.1 mb/d)—Cumulative since February: −507 mb, 2.8 mb/d
Oil on water, August−65 mb—"tanker traffic out of the Middle East came under renewed attacks"
Non-OECD stocks / OECD stocks−52 mb (led by China) / +23 mb—OECD commercial builds offset a 19 mb government draw

Read the first row against the fifth. Supply is down 5.7 mb/d and demand is down 2.5 mb/d, so the market has been closing a gap of roughly 3 mb/d, and the inventory row says how: an average draw of 2.8 mb/d since February. The IEA does not put a date on the point at which "buffers shrinking" becomes buffers gone. It says the need to resolve the conflict "is greater than ever to avoid further market tightening and demand destruction". That is as far as the agency goes, and a reader should not go further on its behalf.

The diesel line, and who it applies to

The section the IEA titles "Diesel squeeze" is the one to file. Total Gulf oil exports in August were "around 13 mb/d, nearly half their pre-war level". Crude losses "narrowed to just below 45%", helped by flows bypassing the Strait and US escorts through Hormuz. Refined product and LPG exports "remain nearly 60%, or 3.7 mb/d, less than in February". And then the specific number: "net exports of diesel/gasoil from the Gulf countries averaged 390 kb/d in August, just over a quarter of pre-war levels". With Russian product exports at "a near-halt", the two regions' combined diesel exports were 1.6 mb/d below February, when they were "almost 45% of global seaborne trade".

So the crude pipe is running at a bit over half and the diesel pipe at a quarter. Diesel, the IEA notes, is "nearly 30% of global demand", and in the United States it passed $200 a barrel in early September, "94% above pre-war levels, with Europe and Asia not far behind". Crude at 45% above pre-war is the number on the screen; product at 94% is the number on the fuel invoice. For a buyer whose fuel arrives as finished diesel rather than as crude, the 390 kb/d line applies more directly than the Brent print does. The Rs 398.04 notified on 11 September is the same fact, expressed in rupees per litre.

Which Brent? Five numbers that all carry the name

The week's coverage has been imprecise about a word. "Brent" in the IEA report, in CNBC's Friday close and in the National's weekly wrap are three different series, and a contract that indexes to "Brent" without saying which is a contract with a dispute in it.

SeriesFigureDateSource
North Sea Dated, monthly average$91.00/bbl (+$7.61 on July)August 2026IEA OMR
North Sea Dated, daily$113.48/bbl9 SeptemberIEA OMR
ICE Brent futures "at the time of writing"~$105/bbl, "45% above pre-war levels"Early SeptemberIEA OMR
ICE Brent, Friday settlement$104.61, −2.8% on the day, +8.7% on the week11 SeptemberCNBC; The National ($104.6, −2.81%)
ICE Brent, intraday high$126.4130 AprilThe National

Physical Dated Brent on 9 September was roughly $8 above the ICE futures price the IEA quotes. The IEA reports both facts in one sentence: "backwardation reached extreme levels" and "physical benchmarks were significantly higher". In plain terms, the barrel you can take delivery of this week costs a good deal more than the one the screen quotes for November. Anyone whose supply contract or fuel surcharge references Brent should check which of the five it means. On WTI the record is worse: CNBC's article body gives Friday's settlement as $100.05, down 2.4%, and a correction appended to the same article gives $99.66, down 2.75%. The National has $100, down 2.37%. This piece uses Brent for that reason.

The OPEC+ table: who is actually producing

The public page carries one full table, OPEC+ crude production, and it is the clearest statement of what "10 mb/d shut in" means by country.

ProducerJuly 2026 (mb/d)August 2026 (mb/d)August vs implied targetImplied target
Saudi Arabia8.245.97−4.4510.42
Iraq2.883.86−0.554.40
Kuwait1.802.04−0.622.66
Iran (exempt from cuts)2.722.16——
Russia8.568.36−1.539.89
Kazakhstan1.551.90+0.281.62
Total OPEC+34.5733.11——

Saudi Arabia produced 5.97 mb/d in August against an implied target of 10.42, a gap of 4.45 mb/d in one country, and down from 8.24 in July. Deutsche Bank's Jim Reid, quoted by CNBC on Friday, noted that Saudi output "has fallen to its lowest since 1990". Iraq and Kuwait, by contrast, rose month on month, and Kazakhstan is above target. The IEA's "10 mb/d shut in" is not evenly spread; it is concentrated in the one producer that also anchors the region's refined-product exports.

Signals and Macros market recap title card for 11 September 2026 showing a sector rotation chart and the line Pipeline Shut Spikes Oil Risk
From S&P 500 Defies 90% Fed Hike Odds and $100 Oil Spike | Market Recap [2026-09-11] by Signals & Macros. Used as a lead for Friday's tape; settlement figures are CNBC's and The National's.

What happened this week, as reported, and what is confirmed

A compliance reader distinguishes between the two. Confirmed by the organisations that publish the numbers: Brent settled at $104.61 on Friday 11 September (CNBC), ending a five-day run of gains; Brent's weekly gain was 8.7%. Reported, with attribution: Kpler data cited by The National had seven vessels transit the Strait of Hormuz on Thursday, down from twelve on Wednesday and eighteen on Tuesday, against more than 100 a day before the conflict began in February; 27 vessels crossed Bab el-Mandeb on Thursday against 32 the day before. The Houthis took Mokha, near Bab el-Mandeb, on Thursday (The National, citing MUFG's Soojin Kim on the market reaction). And CNBC's Friday piece, citing Iranian state media, said Tehran "will meet with Gulf states in Oman to discuss the Strait of Hormuz". That last item is a report of a statement, not a scheduled event with a published agenda, and it should be described that way until Monday.

One more distinction. The IEA's demand and supply figures are for the calendar year and are revised monthly; the September report moved demand by 940 kb/d and supply by 1.3 mb/d in a single month. A budget built on the August report is already out of date by those amounts. A 2027 budget built on "recovery deferred until 2027" should note that the IEA's 2027 rebound, +8 mb/d supply and +2.6 mb/d demand, is a forecast of normalisation, and the agency's own text conditions it on a resolution it does not predict.

What to write down before Monday

Three things. First, the diesel exposure: for any contract with a fuel clause, establish whether it references crude or product, and whether "Brent" means Dated or ICE, because the spread between them this week was $8 and the spread between crude and diesel was 49 percentage points of pre-war price. Second, the date: the IEA has moved the Gulf's recovery to 2027 in writing. Any escalation clause, force majeure notice or delivery schedule that assumed a 2026 normalisation should be re-read against that sentence. Third, the source: quote the IEA's figures from the IEA's page, dated 11 September, and not from a summary. The report's next edition is in October, and the numbers will move again.

Vesprr's group buys, ships and machines against these same figures every week. If you want the cost-sheet version of this report for your own contracts, ask us.

Sources