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Panama Canal chief eyes major gains as Iran crisis chokes off Strait of Hormuz shipping route

The Panama Canal administrator touted the canal’s logistical capabilities and plans to improve supply chain readiness as the Strait of Hormuz reaches a near standstill due to the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran.

Dr. Ricaurte Vásquez Morales, the authority administrator for the Panama Canal, sat down during an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital and noted the canal’s anticipated improvements as the world’s busiest commercial shipping route, the Strait of Hormuz, has seen little to no traffic over the past few days.

“We have been through the years a major channel to move LNG from the U.S. to Asia,” Morales told Fox News Digital. “Qatar usually supplies Asia, and after the Ukraine war, most of the American LNG has gone to Europe to replace the Russian LNG.”

“What we see is that probably prices are going to go up for LNG, which means that the current cost of the inventory on the vessel is going to increase,” he continued. “Fuel prices are going to go up.”

Morales predicts that transit will increase in the Panama Canal as restraints in the Strait of Hormuz have continued to hold.

“The Panama Canal should get one or two transits a day, which is, in the old days, we had about three transits per day,” Morales added. “So it’s gonna come up a little bit and moving from the East Coast of the United States to Asia.”

The Strait of Hormuz normally facilitates the transit of roughly 20–21 million barrels of oil per day. Since last Friday, only four cargo ships have successfully traveled through the strait, and one of those ships was carrying corn.