- Issued
- Data cutoff
- Horizon
- 135 days
- Resolves by
- Next review
- Epistemic class
- Forecast (modeled, not observed)
- Evidence status
- reported
How this resolves
Resolves TRUE if IMF PortWatch's published daily Hormuz transit-call series averages below 88 calls per day across October 2026. Resolves FALSE if the October 2026 average is 88 or above. PortWatch is the sole deciding source: no news report, tracker, or commercial estimate may substitute for it. If PortWatch discontinues the Hormuz series or changes its transit-call definition incompatibly, this resolves UNRESOLVABLE rather than being scored against a different measure.
Resolution source: IMF PortWatch daily chokepoint transit calls, Strait of Hormuz series
Assumptions
- PortWatch's stated peacetime Hormuz baseline is roughly 88 commercial vessel transits per day.
- Reporting citing PortWatch recorded as few as 10 transits on 12 July 2026, far below that baseline — a much deeper disruption than the 38-43/day figure circulating in general news coverage.
- The 17-18 June 2026 U.S.-Iran memorandum opened a 60-day negotiating window rather than a settled arrangement, and reported vessel strikes resumed from 7 July 2026.
- War-risk insurance and routing decisions unwind over months, not days, even after a security improvement.
Leading indicators to watch
- IMF PortWatch's weekly update to the Hormuz daily transit-call series
- Whether the 60-day negotiating window from the June memorandum produces a permanent agreement
- War-risk insurance availability and pricing for Gulf transits
What would make this wrong
- A permanent U.S.-Iran settlement with verified free transit and a rapid return of traffic to the ~88/day baseline.
- PortWatch revising its stated peacetime baseline materially upward or downward.
- PortWatch discontinuing the Hormuz series (resolves unresolvable, not false).
Weak-source disclosure
Competing evidence
Credible sources point in different directions here. Both readings are shown rather than averaged into a single false number.
- Evidence toward normalization: the June 2026 memorandum produced a real, measurable traffic recovery, and the EIA judged the reopening significant enough to cut its 2026 Brent forecast by roughly $13/b. — EIA — Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO)
- Evidence toward persistence: reporting citing PortWatch put transits at roughly 10 on 12 July 2026 against an ~88/day baseline, and strikes reportedly resumed from 7 July — suggesting the June recovery was fragile. — IMF PortWatch — daily chokepoint transit calls and trade volume
Known data gaps
- Warconomy could not transcribe PortWatch's Hormuz series directly (JavaScript dashboard); the baseline and recent readings come from reporting citing PortWatch. Reading the CSV/API export directly is the outstanding hardening step.
- PortWatch's own AIS-degradation caveat in conflict zones means the true transit count is uncertain in an unquantified direction.
Version history
- Supersedes Strait of Hormuz daily transits stay below pre-crisis levels through October 2026 (issued July 18, 2026).
Methodology
Asks whether something that is currently disrupted will still be disrupted by a certain date, on the reasoning that shipping and insurance decisions unwind slowly.
Uncertainty: Coarse probability band reflecting how far the current value sits from the threshold relative to its recent volatility.
Validation: Resolved against the named publishing authority's own figure at the resolution date. Baseline: 'persistence' (assume today's state simply continues), which this model must beat to be worth running.
Full model card: Threshold persistence v1.0.
Sources
| Source | Type | Link |
|---|---|---|
| IMF PortWatch — daily chokepoint transit calls and trade volume | Intergovernmental | portwatch.imf.org/pages/data-and-methodology |
| Open-source Strait of Hormuz transit tracking and news aggregation | Industry | global-energy-flow.com/hormuz/ |
| EIA — Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO) | Official | www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/ |
All forecast fields (accessible table)
Every field of this forecast record, as published.
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Forecast ID | fc-2026-07-18b-hormuz-transits-portwatch |
| Target variable | Strait of Hormuz average daily ship transit calls (IMF PortWatch basis) |
| Target event | IMF PortWatch's average daily Hormuz transit calls for October 2026 remain below 88 per day (its stated peacetime baseline) |
| Prediction | very likely (roughly 80-95%) |
| Issue date | 2026-07-18 |
| Data cutoff | 2026-07-18 |
| Horizon (days) | 135 |
| Resolution date | 2026-11-30 |
| Resolution source | IMF PortWatch daily chokepoint transit calls, Strait of Hormuz series |
| Status | active |
| Epistemic class | forecast |
| Evidence status | reported |
| Model | threshold-persistence-v1 v1.1 |
| Hindcast | No |
Machine-readable: /forecasts/data.json