ManyVoices

Oil prices fell and stocks rose on Wednesday in a volatile trading session as investors seized on signs that the turmoil in the Persian Gulf may be easing.

On Tuesday night, President Trump said that he would pause the day-old U.S. operation to escort commercial ships through the Strait of Hormuz and cited what he called “great progress” toward a peace agreement with Iran.

Oil prices plunged further on Wednesday, briefly dipping below $100 a barrel, after news reports that the Trump administration had made another proposal to end the war.

But oil retraced some of that decline after a spokesman for Iran’s parliamentary national security committee said that the reported proposal was “more a list of American wishes than a reality.”

The drop in oil prices may not last, particularly if the latest developments turn out to be a false dawn, said Neil Atkinson, a senior fellow at the National Center for Energy Analytics and the former head of the oil division at the International Energy Agency.

“The oil market continues to degrade because the lack of supply crisis,” he added. “The oil market is burning, and economies — particularly in developing countries — are suffering great stress.”