Add a month at sea and $2.5 million - what it costs oil tankers to flee Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb

With two of its key oil export routes - the Hormuz and Bab el- Mandeb straits - disrupted by Iran and Iran-allied Houthi militants, Saudi Arabia has to resort to exporting oil via Egypt's Suez Canal.While the kingdom has previously used the Suez route to export some of its oil, it has not tested it as the main export outlet for decades.Unlike in the 1970s and 1980s, when Saudi Arabia's top oil buyers sat in Europe and the United States, the majority of its buyers today are in Asia.To get to Asia, tankers with Saudi oil will have to circumnavigate the whole of Africa, adding around a month …READ FULL ARTICLE