Global oil prices settle above $90 a barrel after U.S. and Iran exchange fire for first time in a month

JUST IN: Global oil prices settle above $90 a barrel after the US and Iran exchange fire for the first time in a month.

Oil just settled above ninety dollars a barrel. The trigger, the US and Iran traded fire again, the first exchange in a month.

A month of quiet had traders hoping the worst was behind us. Crude had been drifting lower, tankers were moving, insurance rates were easing. Then the shooting resumed and the market snapped straight back to fear pricing. You can see the traffic sitting offshore right here, ships anchored and waiting while everyone figures out what's safe.

All of it comes back to the same stretch of water, the Strait of Hormuz, where roughly a fifth of the world's oil has to pass whether anyone likes it or not. Every headline out of that channel now carries a price tag.

And that price tag doesn't stay at the docks. It follows you to the pump, the airfare, the grocery run. Ninety dollar oil after one exchange of fire. That's how thin the calm actually was.

This is Sara White, reporting for HIT.