Risk of major oil price surge

Iraq will be foremost in investors’ minds as oil price risk has returned to markets, complicating the task for central banks whose policies are beginning to diverge for the first time since the global financial crisis.

Oil prices neared nine- month highs late last week, tipping $115 (€85) a barrel, and the rapid advance of militants in Iraq, the second largest OPEC producer, is destabilising oil markets.

That has implications for inflation in the US and Europe, as well as Asia’s export-orientated economies that are large net importers of oil.