Chevron CEO warns oil buffers that cushioned the Iran war shock have been ‘drained’—and diesel relief may not come until 2027

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The Iran war has pushed fuel prices to record highs, and the head of America’s second-largest oil company says the world has run out of easy ways to absorb the shock.

“Those are all buffers in the system that have bought us time, but they’ve been drained,” Chevron CEO Mike Wirth told CNBC’s Squawk Box Europe on Oct. 7. “And so we’re at much lower levels of inventory right now, and it makes the system more vulnerable to disruption.”