‘Oh, boy’: Oil industry frets over Trump's profit-minded Iran post

Trump’s social-media post is a potential public relations hurdle for an industry that has a complicated relationship with the president.

Attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz are snarling oil-tanker traffic — and sending prices soaring. | Royal Thai Navy/AFP via Getty Images

President Donald Trump may think his war in Iran is a boon for the oil industry — but his way of putting it is causing consternation.

“The United States is the largest Oil Producer in the World, by far, so when oil prices go up, we make a lot of money,“ Trump wrote in a Truth Social post Wednesday as crude prices rose to $95 per barrel, a 40 percent increase from where they were before the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran nearly two weeks ago.

Trump’s post highlights the industry’s complicated relationship with the president — and its messaging conundrum. While oil companies are benefiting financially from the nearly $30-per-barrel run up in crude prices since the war started, executives are also worried that volatile prices are making business decisions difficult, and high prices will generate public backlash.

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