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What's in the World is a daily podcast from the BBC World Service.
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Weapons, money and ships, it sounds familiar, but this Iran deal hits different.
We're not quite clear on exactly how many ships have gone through, and I wouldn't imagine we will be for a few days.
12.5 million barrels of oil went through the Strait of Hormuz.
That is a high since the beginning of the conflict.
It's World Business Report from the BBC World Service.
I'm Vishala Sripathma.
On the way.
Shipping giants are on edge with fears.
A new US-Iran deal could pave the way for charges on the Strait of Hormuz.
And the Tartan army charmed the Americans into legalising haggis.
All eyes are on the Strait of Hormuz once again as the US Vice President J.D.
Vance says the deal between America and Iran is already bearing fruit.
Last night, 12.5 million barrels of oil went through the Strait of Hormuz.
That is a high since the beginning of the conflict.
Oil prices are down nearly at their level from the pre-war conflict.
Gas prices dropped below $4 a gallon today for the first time since the conflict.
And importantly, they're going to keep falling further given how low oil prices are.
So this all follows President Donald Trump and Iranian officials signing what they're calling a Memorandum of Understanding, essentially a first step towards ending their war.
It stretches the current truce by another 60 days, giving both sides a bit of breathing room to try and hammer out a full peace deal.
But in the shipping world, that's ringing a few alarm bells.
There are fears it could lead to charges on the strait. a route that's always been free.
So big questions then for the maritime world.
What could this mean for costs, for trade and ultimately for prices we all pay?
John Storpert is Head of the Marine Department and Secretary of the Marine Committee in the UK.
We have seen a lot of ships moving, certainly earlier in the day, to make use of the two channels.
There's one in the north of the strait, one in the south of the strait, with a view to getting out of the Gulf region.
But it's unclear what conditions apply and who is overseeing those transits.
So really we're still kind of in limbo to understand the full impact of it and what actually is going to be put in place for, I guess, the next 60 days.
And how is the situation at the moment?
How much traffic is going through the Strait of Hormuz right now?
It was going at about 10 ships a day through the Omani route, which the US Navy has overseen.
I haven't seen complete figures, but there was an awful lot of shipping looking to use the northern route earlier today.
That may have changed since the IRGCN said that they still controlled things.
So We're not quite clear on exactly how many ships have gone through, and I wouldn't imagine we will be for a few days.
There is some concern over the language used in the terms and conditions of the accord signed today.
What concern do you share?
And also is there any clarity over whether ships will be charged now to go through the Strait of Hormuz?
This is the 64000 question is what is meant by maritime services and what is envisaged in terms of the deal that will be put in place after 60 days?
So tolls, in our view, are unacceptable.
This is an international waterway.
Freedom of navigation should be respected by all literal states.
Maritime services puts it in a different kind of ballpark though, because there are equivalents where states, rather than ships and companies, pay into funds to look after aids to navigation and to help with oil spill cleanups.
So it's really unclear what that means, but we would hope that any lasting peace deal that goes beyond the MOU would actually return it to a state of affairs Prior to the war, where ships could just transit freely through these straits.
OK, and just to be clear previously there was no, there hasn't been any charge to go through the Strait of Hormuz.
No, there's no precedent for it and there's no mechanism under international law that would allow it in an international waterway.
And so the voluntary fund is something that states pay into, not industry.
Exactly.
That's how it would work.
It would be a state initiative.
And I assume, again, it's very, very hazy at the moment what is meant by this language.
But one assumes that it will be overseen by the International Maritime Organization.
But at the moment, that fund doesn't exist.
Is that right?
There's nothing in place at the moment for the straightforward moves.
Why is it then that now it needs to exist if it hasn't previously?
That I can't answer because there doesn't seem to be any justification for it.
You could argue that OK, maybe they can improve the services they provide to shipping, but it's not been an especially problematic waterway.
There's not been more incidents of one type or another if we're talking about safety of life at sea, incidents or environmental incidents here than anywhere else.
So it seems... rather opportunistic to suggest that this should be part of the solution.
And ultimately I think it would be counterproductive because of course it will just increase the costs for consumers everywhere, including in those literal states.
That was John Storpert, head of the Marine Department and secretary of the Marine Committee.
Well, questions are also being asked about how this deal impacts Iran.
And joining us now is Amir Hanjani, who is a board member at the Quincy Institute in New York.
Thank you, Amir, for joining us.
So, pleasure to be with you.
Amir, can you tell us a bit about how this war has impacted ordinary Iranians?
Well, I think they've been under substantial pressure over the last few years because of sanctions, mismanagement of the economy.
And we have to remember there was...
A war last June, a year ago, for the 12-day war, when Israel and the United States attacked Iran.
And then, between then and this war, we had protests, economic protests, because the price of living had gone, living standards had come down.
The price of living had gone higher than living standards had not met.
And so there was a lot of dissatisfaction in the streets.
And then, of course, now we had this war as well, which has caused even more pressure on the average Iranian.
So life in Iran has gone from bad to worse.
And is the economy reliant on oil?
Much less so than it was a decade or two ago.
I mean, Iran has domestic production.
It's actually got – it does more – exports more than just oil.
It exports a lot of food and exports fast-moving consumer goods to its neighboring countries in the CIS and also in Iraq and the Caucasus.
But oil is the quickest export. and most lucrative way for Iran to gain hard currency.
It is still a net exporter of goods and it uses that oil revenue to buy things such as wheat and soybeans and corn and heavy machinery that it can't produce.
And so how will people feel about the war ending?
Because we heard about people going to the streets in sort of protest against the regime there.
But also, as you mentioned, it's been quite disruptive to daily life as well.
Look, I think the reason why you didn't see more protests during the war is because I think the average Iranian viewed the war as being unjust.
This was the second time that Iran was attacked publicly.
There was no legal basis under international law for the attack.
Iran wasn't attacking the U.S. bases.
It had not closed the Straits of Hormuz.
It wasn't attacking Israel.
They were in negotiations with the United States, as they were over the summer last year, before the 12-day war.
And I think the average Iranian saw that, while there's no love lost between them and the government, they saw that as unjust and unfair.
And there's been a rally around the flag.
Because of that.
So I think that they are happy that the war is over, because no one likes bombs being dropped over their heads and the death of school children and everything.
Bombing of civilian infrastructure is never good.
At the same time, they know that they have a long road ahead to rebuild their economy and get things back to a semblance of normality.
It's going to take some time, and they can only do that through peace, not war.
Okay, Amir, thank you very much for joining us.
Amir Hanjani, a board member at the Quincy Institute in New York.
Well, we're going to go and check in on the financial markets now.
And Jacob Chen is our markets guest, a financial advisor from Brighton Securities.
Hi, Jacob.
So Jacob, you've had quite a bit of news in the last few days over central banking decisions and inflation.
You had yesterday with Kevin Walsh talking about interest rates in the US, holding interest rates in the US.
And we've had the Bank of England today as well holding rates steady.
Yeah, there was a lot of anticipation for this Fed meeting because it was Kevin Warsh's first meeting as chairman.
And there was a lot of talk about the direction that the Fed would take, because the current administration has been vocal about wanting interest rate cuts to stimulate the economy, but also inflation has stayed higher as well.
And Warsh ended the Fed meeting by saying the committee will deliver price stability, meaning they're going to prioritize curbing inflation.
And because of that, investors have gone from earlier in this year expecting rate cuts to now expecting a good chance that there's going to be rate hikes by the end of the year.
And what has that done for investors?
Because there just seems to be quite a bit of volatility there, even though we're hearing about record highs.
If you look at intraday movements, they tend to go up and down.
Yeah, there certainly has been a lot of volatility this year.
One, because of anticipation of direction of the Fed.
Two, because of the conflict in Iran.
Because the thing that investors don't like most is uncertainty.
And we've had a lot of uncertainty this year and that's what's led to the volatility in the markets.
And do you think that's something that's going to continue?
Like today.
We heard from Apple, for example, that they're planning to raise their prices of their products because of the cost of memory chips.
And memory chips is a big sector on the financial markets and it's doing quite well at the moment.
We're seeing those sorts of companies surge in share prices.
Yeah, this is a time of high volatility and it could absolutely continue for the future as well.
For example, with Apple raising prices, this may be the biggest case of consumers feeling the AI boom in their wallets right
For a lot of the AI craze it seemed more of an abstract idea, but the price of the iPhone rising is something that most people in the world are going to feel.
And that's where the effects of AI start going from abstract to a reality.
Yes, it'll be interesting to see how demand is impacted by this.
Thanks, Jacob.
You're with us throughout the programme.
You're with World Business Report from the BBC World Service.
Well, we're going to head to Cuba now, where the government's unveiled sweeping reforms, trying to steady an economy that's really under pressure.
Our correspondent Will Grant has been following the story.
The latest proposals by the Cuban Communist Party, led by the Cuban president, Miguel Díaz-Canel, are interesting in that they appear to be a series of steps to try to open up the economy in the face of the tightening of sanctions by washington.
Among the measures is the idea of quote new actors being allowed to operate in the tourism sector.
That is interesting because, of course, so far the tourism sector is tightly controlled by the cuban state, with some bilateral partnerships involving spanish Canadian, for example, Chinese companies.
It sounds like that could be an opening, particularly to Cuban-American investors, on which there is also likely to be a push towards foreign direct investment projects, particularly from US-based entities and individuals.
Cuban-Americans with financial clout may well be welcomed into the economy in a significant way.
There will be efforts.
It seems that there will be an attempt to strengthen, revitalise those stagnated parts of the Cuban economy which are in so dire need.
It is a very, very difficult time for ordinary Cubans in the meantime, who are existing with constant blackouts, near 20 hours a day in many cases, with many basic services not operating, with schools often closed, with hospitals operating at a fraction of their capacity.
There is a hope within ordinary Cubans that these proposals might be enough to ease some of the pressure currently being heaped on the island by the Trump administration.
So Will Grant there on those rather stark big changes announced today by the Cuban government and also the difficulties that ordinary Cubans are facing right now.
Well, earlier I caught up with Ricardo Costa.
He's a political research fellow at the University of Washington in D.C.
He says ordinary Cubans will welcome any effort to ease the crisis, but also warns this plan has still plenty of holes.
The question is now whether these measures are technically possible.
The question has always been whether the political will exist to fully implement them.
And I think that's where the, you know, skepticism by some is justified.
So because Cuba has a long record of announcing reforms and then delaying them, you know, diluting them or reversing them when they create political discomfort or when the situation gets better.
And more recently it's had to deal with sanctions from the United States and also a fuel blockade as well.
How has that impacted the economy in the last few months?
Yeah, so it's important to say that the Cuba's energy crisis, especially the electricity generation deficit, has been going on for years.
And it got worse in 2026 when Cuba got cut off from Venezuelan oil.
And then the US imposed a de facto oil embargo by threatening tariffs to the countries that trade oil or send oil to Cuba.
It's had important effects.
Cuba ran out of jet fuel, for instance, so airlines started suspending flights to the capital.
So demand has dried out.
You know, international visitors, their numbers are down almost 60 percent all the way to May.
Tourism is one of Cuba's most important industries, key generator of foreign cash.
You know, transportation within the country as well.
So we're seeing the impact of that on prices, for instance.
So no doubt there's significant impact.
Then oil sanctions related to foreign investors.
Some you know hotel chains have left the country, but also mining companies like Sherry, the Canadian mining company that operates the most important nickel plant in the country, halted operations there.
And so, yeah, there's been a huge impact.
So that's why I think that we've got to be very cautious when it comes to forecast the success of this round of reforms.
Because I don't see, it's not clear to me how domestic reforms alone will turn the tides on the Cuban economy.
Another sort of aim is to attract money from Cubans abroad.
Do you think that's going to work?
I think we have to separate this into two types of investment or contribution or participation, because most of the Cuban diaspora lives in the United States and is subject to US law.
By U.S. law, you cannot invest in Cuba.
That is not going to happen.
Not even mentioning the fact that there are other issues around US capital participating in the Cuban economy, related to the Herzberg claims around confiscated property and so forth.
So without those, that large scale participation is not feasible.
It's not legal.
It's not going to happen.
So that was Ricardo Costa there speaking to me earlier about those reforms announced in Cuba, and we'll be following developments on that closely.
Let's head to Russia now, where dozens of drones hit an oil refinery in what appears to be the largest Ukrainian drone attack on the Moscow region since the start of their war.
So that was the sound of one hitting one of Moscow's most important energy facilities.
And the damage is causing fuel supply bottlenecks and shortages in the south of the country and annexed Crimea.
And if you were listening to Tuesday's episode, you would have heard about the petrol shortages and how people are queuing for hours just to fill up their tanks.
Well, Stephanie Baker of Bloomberg is the author of Punishing Putin Inside the Global Economic War to Bring Down Russia.
She told Sean Lay how bad the shortages are in Crimea.
I think it is bad.
The recent strikes are increasingly focused on the broader logistics network in Crimea, rather than just military assets.
So the Ukrainian drone campaign has struck multiple roads bridges, depots and fuel tankers and trucks moving through that land corridor between Russia and Crimea.
That has resulted in severe fuel shortages.
Reports that people need to get a QR code from the government app Max in order to be able to buy fuel with long waiting lines.
So it's having an impact as well as really turning away the Russian tourists who go there regularly in the summer.
And when you say that the focus is on the land link between Crimea and Russia, does this mean that now some tanker drivers kind of don't want to do the job or don't want to risk driving fuel up and down that link?
Well, I think traffic on those routes has dropped.
And I think the strategy is to make those routes unsafe, not just for military supplies but fuel supplies, and cut off Crimea.
It's a deliberate strategy to isolate the peninsula.
And it's something that Kirill Budanov, Ukraine's head of military intelligence, told me in an interview a couple of years ago that they saw that they had an asymmetric advantage by attacking that land corridor.
And I think now they've been able to do it more systematically because of the growth of Ukrainian drone production and capabilities.
And it is having an impact and forcing Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, to try to dismiss the reports of fuel shortages.
He's blamed it on panic buying.
But you know, the reports on social media are very real.
And the vulnerability of Crimea, is that really geographical as much as anything else?
Or has Russia in a sense neglected to protect a part of Ukraine which it annexed more than a decade ago now?
It's mostly down to the geography and the fact that it doesn't have oil production or refining capacity itself.
So it's quite easy to isolate the peninsula.
Of course, there have been fuel shortages reported across Russia and other regions.
Russia has imposed a gasoline export ban through the summer because of those shortages and That really stems from Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian refineries across the country.
Crimea carries a symbolic value and a military strategic value for Russia.
They use it as a staging ground and a military supply route for other Russian-occupied regions in Ukraine.
So I think they view that as important to undermine Russia's campaign elsewhere in eastern Ukraine has eased a little as a result of the Iranian war, as countries in Europe and the United States, for example, want to keep oil exports flowing.
But domestic supply for Russians themselves.
If that's starting to become a weakness, how vulnerable does that make the kind of war effort in Russia?
I mean it's quite stark, because Russia is one of the largest oil producers and the world is now reportedly planning on importing gasoline this summer.
It really does bring home the costs of this war to the Russian people, that this is causing a huge amount of disruption and hitting their economy, that they should not be having to block gasoline exports because of the shortages and the problems that they're experiencing at refineries.
So I think it's definitely having an impact and potentially undermining Putin's ability to sustain the war.
That was Stephanie Baker of Bloomberg and author of Punishing Putin Inside the Global Economic War to Bring Down Russia.
Well, we're going to end today's episode on a rather sheepish note.
So that was the governor of Massachusetts in the US.
Her name is Maura Healey and she declared that she has unofficially legalised haggis, as the state continues to welcome Scotland fans to its capital city of Boston during the World Cup.
Haggis has been illegal in the US since the 1970s due to food regulations relating to the consumption of sheep lung, which is used in the traditional recipe.
Christine Newlands has been making haggis for many years and runs the Rendles online butcher with her sons in Stirling Scotland.
If I'm being perfectly honest, I wasn't aware that it was illegal.
But when I was told that it was legal, I was actually really pleased because obviously the World Cup has brought us to the fore.
The Scottish fans are over there.
Of course, they'll be pushing to get.
They would like to taste their Scottish produce while they're there.
So it's a massive, massive moment for the Scottish butchers and all who produce the haggis.
Well, Christine, they certainly have made an impression, haven't they?
Certainly on the east coast of the United States, as you said.
For those people that have only had the American version...
What are they actually missing from a proper haggis?
The haggis contains the lungs, the hearts and the liver of the sheep.
So they're obviously... missing any flavour etc and texture that the lungs can bring to that.
And why do those traditional ingredients matter so much would you say?
I suppose it probably originates from way back, when they first started making haggis and I suppose, like many, many things that originate, you don't like to deviate from it.
And it's the original versions that you would like to continue to eat.
And as a butcher, what goes into making a great haggis, would you say?
What's the secret?
Well, I suppose every butcher's got their own secrets and their own way of making it.
For us, our haggis, it's a nice, savoury, quite spicy, I suppose you would say.
It's actually been a runner-up in the World Championships.
People's Choice and the Oban Festival.
Wow, well done.
Congratulations.
So we're quite fortunate that when we enter competitions, people seem to enjoy it and they come back for more, thankfully.
So would you be interested in selling your produce abroad?
We would be interested if the market opened up further.
So that was Christine Newlands.
She runs the Rendles Online Butcher in Stirling, Scotland.
Jacob, what's your verdict?
Yay or nay on haggis?
I'll say yay on that.
Say yay on that.
So you want it to be legalised in America so you can give it a go.
I think I like that, yeah.
I can sense your enthusiasm there, Jacob.
I've never actually tried haggis and I didn't realise it wasn't legal to eat it in America either.
So that's a bit of news to me as well.
That's it from World Business Report.
Don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
Smart glasses are big business.
According to Meta, the largest maker, 7 million pairs have been sold around the world.
But some people have reported being secretly recorded by them.
Even though it was a public space...
The interaction was private.
He didn't let me know that he was filming me.
Join me, Icra, to hear about the controversial side to smart glasses.
What's in the World is a daily podcast from the BBC World Service.
We explain a different topic every weekday in less than 15 minutes.
Find us wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
