On 28 February, military action began that effectively closed the Strait of Hormuz; the chokepoint through which roughly 20% of global oil supply flows.
By April 7, Brent crude had spiked to $138 a barrel. The monthly average for April was $117, the highest since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The TASI fell to its lowest point since March 2023. My portfolio fell with it.
The dividends arrived on schedule.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED
The Hormuz closure was a supply shock. Oil prices surged because nearly a fifth of global crude supply was suddenly in question. At the same time, investor sentiment across Gulf equity markets deteriorated, geopolitical risk repriced everything, regardless of the underlying fundamentals of individual companies.
This is the disconnect most people miss.
The index fell because sentiment fell. The companies in my portfolio kept operating. Aramco kept producing. Al Rajhi kept lending. Jarir kept selling. Saudi Sukuk kept paying its coupon.
The capital value of my portfolio dropped. The income did not.
WHAT I DID
The automated transfer went in as usual.
I did not sell. I did not pause the standing order. I did not wait for clarity before making my next move.
I did check, once, that none of my positions had announced a dividend suspension or a material operational disruption. None had.
Then I closed the app.
This is not bravery. It is the system working as designed. The whole point of building an automated, income-focused portfolio is that it should not require a decision every time the news gets loud.
The version of me that watches financial Twitter, reads every geopolitical take, and adjusts positions based on headlines would have made this significantly worse.
WHAT THIS MEANS FOR A DIVIDEND COMPOUNDER IN THE GCC
Living here during a regional disruption gives you information that remote investors do not have.
The supermarkets were stocked. Flights were operating. Salaries were paid. The physical economy was functioning.
That ground-level signal matters. The gap between what the index was pricing and what was actually happening on the street in Jeddah was significant.
Long-term investors who held through this period and kept their automated contributions running are, on current trajectories, buying quality positions at a discount relative to where the index was six months ago.
That is not a prediction. It is simply the arithmetic of buying consistently during a period when prices are lower.
The Strait of Hormuz will reopen. The EIA expects oil flows to resume gradually from late May. The index will recover or it will not, but the companies I own were paying before this started and are paying now.
That is the only number I am managing to.
Next issue: The non-oil Saudi economy — the part of Vision 2030 that is actually working, and what it means for the investor sitting in Riyadh or Jeddah right now.
— The Quiet Compounder