23JUL

PGSA opens vessel portal, withholds tariff schedule

4 min read

19:27UTC

Iran's Persian Gulf Shipping Authority opened a vessel-submission portal on 18 May yet published no fee schedule by 20 May; Lloyd's of London entered no agreement.

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ConflictDeveloping

Key takeaway

An unpublished tariff preserves case-by-case IRGC leverage and keeps Lloyd's war-risk cover closed across the Hormuz corridor.

Iran's PGSA (Persian Gulf Shipping Authority) opened a vessel-submission portal and an X account on 18 May 2026, four days after the 16 May announcement that "full details" would follow "soon". By 20 May no fee schedule had been published. The PGSA derives its authority from the Majlis-backed Hormuz toll bill enacted in early May and has positioned itself to Lloyd's of London as the sole lawful authority for Hormuz passage certification.

Windward Maritime Intelligence reports up to $2 million per transit paid in yuan, a $1 per barrel cargo toll, and Bitcoin payments to IRGC-linked wallets⁠¹. No contract has surfaced. Lloyd's has not entered any agreement with PGSA; underwriters have informally signalled war-risk cover will not reopen until written rules of engagement exist somewhere, from either Iran or the 26-nation Hormuz coalition.

Iran also extended a bilateral guided-passage architecture with Iraq, Pakistan, Qatar, India and Oman, the latter confirmed by Baghaei on 18 May. Six India-flagged vessels conducted a coordinated cluster transit under Iranian operational assurances on 17 May, and Windward logged dark-AIS (Automatic Identification System) activity surging roughly 600 per cent between 19 April and 3 May. Vessels paying IRGC wallets in bitcoin or yuan go transponder-dark for the crossing, running outside the paper record PGSA is nominally building.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Iran controls the strait of Hormuz, the narrow channel through which roughly 20% of the world's oil passes. Since the war began, Iran has been charging ships to cross through. In May, Iran set up an official authority, the Persian Gulf Shipping Authority (PGSA), to handle the toll collection formally. They even launched a website. But as of 20 May they still have not published what the toll costs. Ships are paying up to $2 million per crossing, sometimes in Chinese currency, sometimes in cryptocurrency, with each deal individually negotiated. Shipping insurance companies, including Lloyd's of London, say they will not reopen their cover for ships crossing until someone publishes written rules. Without insurance, freight costs stay high, which means the goods those ships carry cost more everywhere.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

The Majlis-enacted Hormuz toll bill gave the PGSA statutory authority but did not fix its fee schedule. This structure was deliberate: a legislative mandate for toll-collection combined with executive discretion over pricing preserves maximum leverage at the point of negotiation while giving Iran a legal argument that the tolls are sovereign maritime fees rather than extortion.

Lloyd's refusal to engage the PGSA reflects not hostility to the toll concept but the structural impossibility of pricing open-ended discretionary fees. War-risk underwriters model expected loss against premium income; without a known per-voyage rate there is no loss expectation to price against. The 600% dark-AIS surge compounds this: the fleet Lloyd's cannot see is the fleet Lloyd's cannot price.

What could happen next?

Consequence
Lloyd's informally conditioning war-risk cover on written governance from any Hormuz party means the tariff vacuum directly prolongs the Brent premium and shipping-cost elevation for every European economy importing via Hormuz.
Short term · 0.8
Risk
Two parallel payment systems (PGSA formal permits and IRGC-linked Bitcoin wallets) running simultaneously create a compliance minefield for shipping companies: paying IRGC-linked wallets may violate OFAC sanctions while refusing to pay blocks transit.
Immediate · 0.75
Opportunity
Iran's bilateral guided-passage architecture with Iraq, Pakistan, Qatar, India and Oman creates a de facto regional maritime governance layer that could become a foundation for a published multilateral tariff regime if the broader conflict settles.
Medium term · 0.5

Source Landscape

This story draws on neutral-leaning sources from Israel

Israel

Primary parallel: During the 1984-1988 Tanker War, Iran charged de facto passage fees through the strait of Hormuz by requiring vessels to accept IRGC escort and pay informal 'inspection fees' to IRGC naval units.

Lloyd's War Risks Rating Committee raised Gulf surcharge rates to 2.5% hull value per voyage; operators paid informal IRGC naval units without any printed schedule to reference. The PGSA in 2026 is a more formalised institutional version of that same improvised tax, now backed by Majlis legislation rather than ad hoc IRGC activity.

Counter-parallel: In 2007-2008, the Somali piracy crisis created informal coastal passage fees payable to Puntland pirate networks. Insurance markets eventually produced specific war-risk clauses and standard ransom cover (the 'Institute Warranty Limits' amendment), which required a stable enough threat actor and a settled enough payment mechanism to price.

The Somali model normalised after five years. PGSA is attempting institutional compression of that timeline, but without a published tariff there is no pricing baseline for underwriters.

At $2 million per vessel and approximately 14 vessels transiting per day (Windward's 17 May figure), the PGSA toll generates a theoretical $28 million per day in informal payments, though actual collection is lower given bilateral passage agreements that substitute political engagement for cash.

For shipping companies, the unpublished tariff creates a cost uncertainty that cannot be hedged. A published $2 million fee could be built into freight rates; a negotiated fee that might be $500,000 or $3 million on any given vessel cannot. Freight rates therefore carry a discretionary-toll premium on top of the war-risk premium, compounding the structural Brent spread the IEA model cannot explain.

Consensus view: FPRI's Michael Kofman and Atlantic Council's Jonathan Fulton assess the unpublished tariff as a deliberate operational design. Iran's IRGC has operated informal transit pricing since at least March 2026, running individual vessel negotiations at up to $2 million per transit. The PGSA provides a formal institutional wrapper for that practice without surrendering the case-by-case leverage that generates the highest per-vessel payments.

Counter-view: Chatham House's Homayoun Alizadeh argues the opacity reflects internal institutional competition rather than strategic design: the PGSA reports through the Majlis, but the IRGC wallets receiving Bitcoin payments operate outside the PGSA's formal remit. Tehran may be managing two competing toll systems that the absence of a published tariff keeps from visibly contradicting each other.

Key tension: Whether Lloyd's of London will produce written war-risk terms conditional on any governance document from any Hormuz party, or whether the market is waiting specifically for a US-Iran written agreement before reopening cover.

First Reported In

Update #103 · Senate 50-47; UNSC at Barakah; no US paper

Windward Maritime Intelligence· 20 May 2026

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Causes and effects

Caused by

PGSA goes live on Hormuz transit

PGSA's 18 May portal launch enabled the permit system described in event 3 without producing a public fee schedule.

Occurred 18 May 2026

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Iran and Oman draft Hormuz bilateral

Baghaei's confirmation of Iran-Oman bilateral Hormuz consultations on 18 May deepened the bilateral guided-passage architecture documented in event 3.

Occurred 18 May 2026

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IRGC toll booth live at Hormuz

PGSA as a formal Majlis-backed state authority advances on and institutionalises the IRGC's ad-hoc Hormuz toll regime operational since March (ID:1447).

Occurred 23 Mar 2026

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This Event

PGSA opens vessel portal, withholds tariff schedule

The tariff vacuum preserves IRGC bargaining power per cargo and keeps Hormuz war-risk cover closed; Windward logged a 600% dark-AIS surge as informal yuan and Bitcoin channels ran parallel.

Led to

Rial bill, yuan portal, two ships

PGSA yuan/Bitcoin portal launched 18 May operates on currency rules incompatible with the Majlis rial-only bill

Occurred 20 May 2026

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Iran charts Hormuz with formal PGSA coordinates

PGSA withholding its fee schedule four days after promising one (ID:3477) is the context for the 20 May coordinate publication, which adds cartographic substance while the fee remains absent.

Occurred 20 May 2026

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Different Perspectives

Wang Yi

China's foreign minister and Djibouti's issued a joint communique on 21 October saying the war should not reach the Horn of Africa and stressing free navigation through Bab al-Mandeb. The text names neither Iran nor the Houthis, and Djibouti hosts China's only overseas military base, opposite the Yemeni coast.

Ministry of External Affairs

India's foreign ministry called the attacks on Saudi civilian and energy sites "unacceptable" on 22 October and said they must stop at once. An Indian died at Dammam, Indians were injured there and at Shaybah, and about 4,000 Umrah pilgrims remain stranded by one MP's count.

Iraq

Iraq closed the al-Sheeb crossing with Iran to travellers and trucks from 21 October and said other crossings would close gradually. Unlike September's closure, which ended on a staged timetable, this one has none, and Iran's interior ministry said it received no notice.

Abdel Fattah el-Sisi

Egypt's president said on 21 October that Cairo's support would "defend Saudi territory, and does not include an attack on Yemen". Araghchi warned that Egyptian involvement would further complicate the situation, and Cairo's limit matches the one Ankara set on 8 October against attacking another state's soil.

UK Ministry of Defence

The MoD said on 20 October that RAF Typhoons over Saudi Arabia will not strike the Houthis, but extended tanker support to Saudi operations including against Houthi targets in Yemen. The tanker line sets no limit on strikes, so British aircraft may now refuel Saudi jets on bombing runs.

Turkey

Ankara sent the Mecca Joint Defence Agreement to parliament around 20 October, and its published text treats an attack on one party as an attack on all. Article 16 brings it into force only on the last ratification, so the 5 October invocation in Riyadh could not yet bind Turkey.

Written with AI from Lowdown's published reporting. Not individually reviewed by an editor. Editorial standards.