Crude slips to $96.60 while the Strait headlines do the heavy lifting

WTI closed Friday at $96.60, down $1.40 on the session, a 1.43% move. In isolation that is an ordinary day for crude. In the context of a week in which Qatari mediators flew to Tehran, the UAE confirmed its Hormuz-bypass pipeline is approaching the halfway mark, and Iran published a maritime map that quietly redraws jurisdiction over Emirati and Omani waters, a 1.43% decline is the more interesting number — because it is small.

That is the wrap in one sentence: the diplomacy is loud, the tape i…