Key facts
- Iran has loaded no crude since August 25, according to the US Treasury.
- Another 43 million barrels of Iranian crude remain stranded inside the blockade zone.
- Kpler expects Iranian oil revenue to stop around mid-December because Chinese buyers pay one to two months after delivery.
- Oil accounts directly for roughly 30% of Iran's government budget, according to Gregory Brew of Eurasia Group and Miad Maleki of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
- Iran's Statistical Centre put year-on-year inflation at 88.7% in the month ending October 22.
- The government sends next year's budget to parliament between November 22 and December 21.
Iran is drafting next year's budget on the premise that oil revenue could fall to zero, senior budget official Mohammad Ghasemi told the government on Monday, November 9, 2026, according to Fox News Digital. The US Treasury says Iran has loaded no crude since August 25, and Iranian crude and condensate held at sea outside the US naval blockade fell from 88.8 million barrels on July 14 to zero by mid-October, with another 43 million barrels stranded inside the blockade zone.
Kpler expects Iranian oil revenue to stop around mid-December because Chinese buyers pay one to two months after delivery. Oil accounts directly for roughly 30% of the government budget, according to Gregory Brew of Eurasia Group and Miad Maleki of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and Maleki puts its share of total regime revenue at 50% to 60% once indirect income is counted.
Trump has settled on keeping the blockade in place without new strikes. He said on Monday, November 9, that Gulf states prefer the status quo, then said on Thursday, November 12, that the US does not need a deal with Iran and removed Vice President JD Vance from the negotiations. Vance had opened a direct channel with a letter to Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, who welcomed its tone but insisted Washington accept Iran's conditions first and said no enriched uranium would leave Iran.
Kpler puts Iranian oil production below 2 million barrels a day in the months before late October, down from 3.59 million in February, the month the war began. OPEC's latest report puts Iranian output at almost half its pre-war level. Maleki says Iran will run short of cash in December but will not collapse, telling Fox News Digital in late October that the December timeline is more of a cash flow disruption than a collapse.