Oil prices have surged over 4% after a U.S. airstrike killed a high-ranking Iranian military leader, Qassem Soleimani, the Iranian general who led the Revolutionary Guard’s Quds force. The attack heightens geopolitical risk sentiment with fears of retaliation from Tehran on Middle Eastern energy infrastructure. This comes as tensions have been building after Iran backed Iraqi’s raided the American embassy earlier this week to protest U.S. airstrikes. The trade, now raised with geopolitical risk premium, will be looking ahead to oil demand growth as well as the current deal between OPEC and its partners. OPEC and its allies had agreed to a production cut of an additional 500,00 bpd to 1.2 million bpd that extends through March. Increased U.S. shale output has helped the U.S become the largest oil producer, doubling its oil production to 12.66 million bpd over the last decade according the EIA. Expectations, however, are for slower U.S. production growth to 1.1 million bpd down from 1.6 million bpd the year prior in 2019. With the recent spike in prices, the market is signaling immediate term overbought with today’s range see between 60.38 – 64.