With the Russia-Ukraine conflict intensifying every day, POTUS Joe Biden has recently, announced a ban on all the Russian crude oil and natural gas imports while the United Kingdom announced a phase-out of Russian oil imports by the end of 2022.

These moves by major powers are set to increase crude oil prices at an all-time high level and fuel inflation all across the world.

Such impact could very well drive a wedge between the US and its allies and might prove decisive in sketching out the future course of action against the Russian invasion.

Let's see, How big a player Russia is, in the global oil market?

At around 18-19% of share, the US leads the charts in the global oil output followed by Russia and Saudi Arabia with 12% each.

Apart from being a major oil producer in terms of quantity, Russia yields the second cheapest oil in the global market after Saudi Arabia. Over and above that, Russian oil is of superior quality than what its replacements like Venezuela could provide.

But why were the oil prices rising before the invasion?

From $60 a barrel at the start of 2020, oil prices fell to less than $20 in April due to a supply-side glut during the pandemic. However, the fall didn't sustain for long as the demand quickly outstripped the supply in the post-pandemic phase.

As Russia held back from providing additional supply of natural gas to Europe. The prices of gas also started rising with the subsequent rise in oil making the consumers shift from gas to oil and coal.

Apart from UAE and Saudi Arabia, there's a very limited "spare capacity" within OPEC making it difficult to smoothly run the supply chain during a crisis period.

Continued underinvestment in oil and gas sectors all across the world aggravated by the COP-21 commitments.

Can the global strategic reserves meet the gap?

Top three countries in terms of strategic reserves are the US, China and Japan which can hold back for only 20 days, US sanctions on country with the world's largest oil reserves and low individual production levels will be insufficient to avert this crisis!