Middle East Ceasefire

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1:48The US and Iran have agreed a conditional two week ceasefire. The announcement came around an hour and a half before that deadline that was set by Donald Trump. The oil price has plummeted to its lowest level for almost a month. Stock markets are up as well. We will go through the details of the ceasefire agreement, what needs to happen in the coming weeks, what happens next with the Strait of Hormuz for those people around the Middle East as well. Closer to home, a raft of tax and rule changes have come into effect for British businesses this week. We'll speak to one pub boss about what that means for his ins.

2:26And finally... It's not about the money, money, money. We don't need your money, money, money. We just want to make the world... So that's Price Tag by Jessie J, distributed by, like so many hit songs, by Universal Music Group. There's been a$64 billion bid for the company. We'll speak to a legendary music producer about what a sale could mean for the music business. Wake Up To Money with Sean Farrington. Good morning. Wake Up To Money on BBC 5 Live on this Wednesday morning, the 8th of April. If you saw some of the front pages that were going to be published on the newspapers just before you went to bed last night, you will have seen pictures of the moon alongside the warnings from the United States.

3:13Front of the Times was the US, we won't use nuclear bombs. outrage and fear as Trump warns whole civilisation will die in Iran on the front of the Guardian on the front of the Telegraph Trump Iran's whole civilisation will die and on the Mirror and the Mail very similar front pages in terms of the words the Mirror has that image of the Earth from just the other side of the Moon with the world holds its breath and the Daily Mail with a picture of women and children waving flags as they form a human chain on the White Bridge in a central Iranian city there in front of infrastructure in Iran. The headline in the Daily Mail, Night the World Held Its Breath and Prayed.

3:59Well, we wake up this morning to an Iran and US agreed ceasefire, conditional two-week ceasefire, and an opening of the Strait of Hormuz. So they are some of the top headlines from the agreement that has been announced by those in the US and Iran, Pakistan as well. So Israel has said it supports this ceasefire, but that it does not include Lebanon. Pakistan and Iran previously said that it does include Lebanon. So there will still be things to be ironed out in these couple of weeks, at the very least, if not for longer. We've heard more from Donald Trump just in the last 15 minutes or so. He's been speaking by telephone to the press agency AFP.

4:49Very, very brief call that we only have a transcript of. But when asked if he can claim victory, he says total and complete victory, 100 percent. No question about it. No question about it. When asked about the still lots to agree on, especially this, for example, the Strait of Hormuz, he says we have many points. We have a 15 point transaction of which most of those things have been agreed on. We'll see what happens. We'll see if it gets there. He was asked if China was involved in bringing Iran to the table in this deal. He says, I hear, yes, yes, they were. And what about the uranium? Well, he says, Donald Trump says, that will be perfectly taken care of or I wouldn't have settled.

5:28So that's your very latest. There's lots for us to try and get into and explain here. I've got Gina Abercrombie-Win Stanley with me, who is a distinguished fellow of the Atlantic Council's Middle East program. Gina, good morning to you. Morning. What do you take from what you're seeing has taken place overnight and the announcements we're reading about this morning? Well, my initial reaction is relief, as is everyone else's, and a recognition that both sides blinked. Certainly, President Trump's threat was extraordinary and extraordinarily unpopular domestically. He took criticism around the world, but at home, among Democrats, among Republicans, among the MAGA wing, people were appalled at the hyperbole that the president used about what was next.

6:25So he had pressure to find his way off. The Iranians also blinked because they had been saying since the beginning of this conflict that they would not accept anything short of a full cessation of hostilities. A ceasefire was not going to be enough. And yet, here we are, a two-week ceasefire. So perhaps the president's hyperbole helped convince, if not the Iranians themselves, certainly the mediators. Pakistan doing heroic work aided by Egypt and Turkey and those in the Gulf who were talking to the United States as well about having to find that off ramp because they were going to take the hit if the president carried through and the Iranians responded as expected.

7:16We've got Colonel Brendan Kearney with us as well, who's a military affairs analyst, former chief of staff for America's Marine Forces Europe. Very good morning to you. Thank you for your time. What do you make of what has happened overnight? Well, it's good to be with you, Sean. I echo the commentary that was just made. I think we're all happy that there is a cessation, hopefully permanent, but at least temporarily, with hostilities. And maybe this two weeks will give everybody a chance from all sides and from interested interlocutors out there that can go ahead and make a semblance of a permanence to this so that we don't have the hostilities continuing here 15 days from now after the expiration of the two-week ceasefire.

8:09How will this change on the ground, Brendan, or at least in the wider gulf, maybe not on the ground in Iran so much, but where the American presence has been and where the Israeli presence has been if all of a sudden we hear there's a conditional two-week ceasefire? Well, I think, first of all, you know, the ceasefire gives everybody a chance to go ahead and take a collective breath and to sit back and reflect on what has happened and also what potentially could go right and what could go wrong. But, you know, the practicality is there's still Marines sailing from Southern California. They should be arriving in the Gulf here probably within about five or six days.

9:00They provide flexibility to the president if problems start up again here in two weeks. But, you know, for the most part, I think this is good news. I think the president, whether this is a win or a loss, to me is irrelevant. The win to me is that there are no innocent Iranians dying or Emiratis or, you know, any of the other folks from around the Gulf or Americans. So, you know, this is a win-win if it can stay, if the peace can stabilize itself here. And we get this two weeks under our belt. And during that period of time, the time and negotiations have been given a chance to work. And hopefully that's going to be the case.

9:49Gina, what is needed for that peace to stay? A few things. First, the Iranians, I believe, have proved themselves a strong adversary. Certainly the president thought this would be quicker. The Israelis told him it would be fast. And so the president's vocabulary, which has been very bullying, they must accept my way, is not going to work. It has not been successful. So the negotiators are going to have to reestablish trust. The Iranians have been through two rounds, three rounds with us. One where Mr. President Trump pulled us out of an agreement that was reached that the Iranians abided by. The second time, bombing them in June.

10:40And then the third time, bombing them in February. So there is a definite lack of trust of the American side via the Iranians. mediators should be able to help with that. But the Iranians have some asks, and in order to get to peace, the United States is going to have to concede on some of those as well. I think the most immediate one is likely the compensation. We may well expect the Iranians to continue to charge fees, even as the strait is open. It may not be free to pass through because they are looking for money to rebuild their country. It's going to be urgent. The government is going to be under horrific pressure from Iranian citizens who are going to blame them for getting them into the war and having a very difficult time with the loss of infrastructure, jobs, etc.

11:40They are going to need hard currency and quick. And this may be a way to get the concessions that the United States is looking for, either lifting sanctions immediately or unfreezing assets or letting those fees continue for the straight. Colonel Brendan Kearney, who's also with us, when you see what some of the points on the Iranian version of the 10-point plan that we'd, well, they called it a 10-point plan, Donald Trump's called a 15-point transaction. And as Gina mentions there, payment of compensation to Iran one way or another was listed in there. And Iran talks about the continuation of Iran's control of the Strait of Hormuz.

12:29Is that feasible for there to be a longer-term ceasefire with a point like that? Well, I think bits and pieces of it are certainly feasible. I don't think under any circumstances, as long as Trump is president of the United States, that you will see direct payments from the United States to Iran. I think there would be an easing of sanctions that could actually be relatively easy to accomplish in terms of getting monies into the Iranian pocketbook to help with the repairs over there. But, you know, the thing is, what I'm worried about here, quite frankly, is if those monies, and we'll know very, very rapidly, are going to rearming or in some way restarting the nuclear power program, then you're going to see Donald Trump making the same type of threats and following through exactly the same way he has done, you know, throughout his presidency.

13:36They don't listen to him. And whether you like him or not, you have to listen to him, whether it's the profanity, all those type of things carry a meaning for him. And if push comes to shove, he pushes and he shoves. and, you know, that's my worry. I'm hopeful that calmer minds will prevail and they'll be able to come to some type of agreements, you know, down the road. But unfortunately, Iran's record over the last 47 years is one marked by lies, deception, deceit and the killing of their own people and all those things, if they continue, do not bode well for the current regime, whatever that regime is and whoever it is.

14:24Gina, on that nuclear point, so in Iran's list of a 10-point plan that it said that the US has agreed to, but we haven't got full confirmation of all of this by any means yet. But one of the things in that list is acceptance of uranium enrichment. Can you just remind us, Gina, what the nuclear issue in particular is with Iran here? Well, the nuclear issue has been Iran's efforts to enrich uranium beyond the 3.75, I think, percent that is generally acceptable for peaceful nuclear issues. Youth, rather. So Iran enriched, I believe, all the way up to 60 percent. It wasn't weapons-grade by any means.

15:22And we have to keep in mind, once they got weapons-grade, they did not have a vehicle to deliver it anywhere. They did not have a nuclear weapon. So the insistence that the Israelis have made for the last decades and longer, that the Iranians are two weeks away from having a nuclear weapon, don't stand the test of credibility. That said, they certainly enriched beyond what was needed and kept the Israelis nervous and kept the Americans trying to get them to step back. They had the deal with President Obama. They adhered to that deal. Our intelligence, even Israeli intelligence, and the IAEA said the Iranians were sticking to the deal.

16:10President Trump decided it wasn't good enough. And instead of negotiating from that deal, he pulled us out. So now we've got to get back to how do we get the Iranians to once again go into a verifiable deal that guarantees they are not enriching toward nuclear capability. Brendan just finally from your perspective given your experience you've you've done I read you've done combat tours in the gulf yourself over many many decades um uh as a you know a part of the American military what are the things that need to be at the forefront of America's minds now and those allies of America who, you know, have been sort of relatively quiet in recent days around Europe here in the UK.

17:10You know, I think one of the front pages in the paper and the papers in the UK this morning actually sort of commented on the UK's position on all of this. But so what do they need to be taking into account if this ceasefire is to be something that holds for longer than this conditional first two weeks? Boy, you ask a great question and the complexity of the answers that we could probably talk for hours just on that series of topics and subtopics. The first thing that's going to happen with the both the Americans and the Israelis, although the Israelis are still involved in hostilities in Lebanon that the United States is not, is going to be re-equip and re-arm.

17:56And they're going to do that as a matter of a prudent military action in case they're called upon again here at some point in the near future to reengage in a form of hostilities with Iran. The other thing is, is there's got to be some damage control on the part of the United States and on the part of some of our friends and allies that did not fully support in President Trump's mind. And quite frankly, in the eyes of the majority of American citizenry, the efforts were ongoing. I have heard people here who did not support Trump's efforts in Iran but are deeply, deeply offended by the lack of support from countries such as Spain.

18:50That's the one in particular that has caused a bit of a quiet drumroll here in the United States when it comes to not only Spain itself but also NATO writ large. there's some damage control that's going to have to be conducted. And of course, that's separate from the issue, the immediate issue of hostilities with Iran. So there is a number of issues that are going to have to be addressed here in the coming couple weeks. Obviously, the most important one is to come to some type of conclusion that is going to allow for the free flow of oil through the Gulf and also a continuation of any cessation of hostilities so that we don't have to worry about more innocents dying, which is always going to be the result of military action.

19:44Colonel Brendan Kearney, thank you so much for your time. Military Affairs Analyst, former Chief of Staff for America's Marine Forces Europe. Gina, just finally to you, What is needed to make sure that we're not here again in two weeks' time as we come to the end of this next deadline? Yes. Well, I think the colonel is right about the cleanup on aisle six, as we say, the damage done to the relationship with our European allies. I think most Americans are more understanding than Brendan suggests. It was not a NATO issue. When Article 5 was invoked, it was the United States who invoked it, and they came to our aid, and we remember that.

20:36So I don't believe that the distress with NATO, perhaps among the military, but not among the rest of America. up. There's a lot of adjusting that's going to be done. With the Gulf, for instance, they are going to have to decide, do they get closer to us? If Iran and the United States and Israel don't come to a solid peace agreement, and that means both sides have to give up something, then it is likely that we are going to be here again, and the Gulf states will be caught in the middle. And you're talking, this is Qatar, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, and that's right, Bahrain, etc. Yeah, the GCC states.

21:23So they've got some hard thinking to do. Certainly, the American people are going to ask some very tough questions about how we got here. We've had the Secretary of State say that we started the war because the Israelis were going to start the war and we wanted to get ahead of it. That was an extraordinary admission to make and one that did not make the citizens of the United States happy. We know that the support for the war was never up to 50 percent even, let alone more than that. So there is a hard scrub that's going to be made with regard to political leadership and certainly the president fighting for American security, but he made some commitments to the American people about staying out of Middle East wars.

22:11Well, quite. And I wonder, Gina, you know, given what Colonel Kearney was talking about there, one of the priorities being people not dying, not as many people dying in this war in the Middle East. Another priority that we've talked about has been the US's desires to see Iran not having a plan for a nuclear weapon. But really, does this just come down to petrol prices in America ahead of a midterm election later this year? How much of that is actually driving what Donald Trump wanted to get out of this and how quickly he wanted that off ramp? Yeah. And for Donald Trump, that is important. Again, the New York Times has a really incredible article today about how we got to war.

23:05And one of the expectations apparently from the president is that this would be quick and easy. And it was clear he thought that when he made the announcement via Truth Social and that he thought this was going to be close to Venezuela. Venezuela kept being mentioned and his desire for regime change and somebody that he could work with. The Iranians are a long nation and, you know, nation of Persia and one that is prideful. We Americans forget that during the Iraq-Iran war, they lost between 200 and 500 ,000 young men and boys fighting the Iraqis. We invaded and people will always fight hard for their home.

23:57So we have to adjust our thinking about this. But, you know, North Korea has nuclear weapons and America is not fearful of North Korea attacking us tomorrow. There are ways, even with nuclear armed less than friends, to navigate this via diplomacy. Gina, thank you for your time this morning. Gina Abercrombie, Wynne Stanley there, a fellow distinguished fellow of the Atlantic Council's Middle East programme. Listening to that conversation and the very latest on the events in the Middle East, Rachel Winter is partner and investment manager at Killick & Co. Rachel, good morning. Good morning, Sean.

24:41Now, many people, I mean, almost every single morning, the first thing we have turned to on Wake Up To Money and tried to get an idea of what the consequences of some of this might be further afield outside the Middle East has been the oil price, the stock markets. Now, we've got up to speed with events overnight. What has happened now in terms of traders' view of what the oil price should be? Well, we've had a big drop in the oil price overnight. So Brent crude, which is the global benchmark, is currently down over 13%. So it's now trading just below$95 per barrel. So it is a big drop in a short space of time.

25:19But bear in mind, it is still up over 50 % over this year to date. So that's oil. If we look at equity markets, we have seen quite a big rise overnight, particularly in some of the Asian economies that are big importers of oil. So they have the most to gain from a drop in the oil price. So as an example, the Japanese index, the Nikkei 225, has risen over 5 % overnight. And so if this, you know, we've had a fairly sustained period of the oil price being mostly over$100 a barrel. if it still stayed at this side of$100 a barrel, so below around in the 90s, would that mean the impacts on those households in America, households here in the UK, won't be as severe?

26:08It won't be as severe. But as I said, even if we remain at current levels just below 100, that's still a 50 % rise in a fairly short space of time. So there certainly will still be an inflationary impact. That said, people seem to have that level of$100 per barrel as quite a significant, psychologically important level in their minds. And I think when oil is below that, people seem to feel a bit more comfortable and equity markets perform better. Ian Hoskins, also with us this morning, director of Mar Pub Group in Liverpool, has got five venues in the city. Ian, thank you for your patience. I know we'd normally check in with you at the top of the programme and get some quick reaction, but there's been a lot going on.

26:50There still continues to be lots of comments being made by people around the world. Good morning to you, Ian. Yeah, good morning, Sean. That was fascinating, actually, that chat before with your two guests. It really, really solidified what was really happening there now. Well, and we've heard a lot in recent weeks, Ian, how bosses around the country running businesses small and large almost have to become a little bit more engaged in this stuff because it's all impacting where your energy prices might go, your interest rates might go, the cost of getting your logistics set up and transport costs around the country and around the world.

27:30How has this impacted how you viewed your pub group in recent weeks? Well, I think ever since COVID, you've got to get used to shocks and you've got to be agile enough to be able to predict them in some ways and allow for them. it's not like it was pre-COVID where potentially you could have, you know, nest egg capital there to use in reserves. But you've got to be absolutely more agile how you look at your business and how quickly you can move. You know, I think the new normal now kind of going forward is there are going to be a lot of shocks to businesses and you can't bury your head in the sand.

28:10And clearly what happens in the world does affect your bottom line and particularly the price of oil is, for the likes of any kind of business where you're dealing with suppliers, as you mentioned before, supply chains, et cetera, et cetera, that is something which it's not the cost of you running the business, it's everybody else in your supply chain running their business as well. So you really get a sense of how interconnected everything is. We're just going to cross very quickly to our correspondent in Singapore, Nick Marsh, who every single morning has been bringing us the latest moves from around those commodity markets, those stock markets.

28:48Nick, we just had an update there from Rachel on what's happened with the oil price. I just wonder from an Asian investor perspective, countries around Asia perspective as well, what you could bring to us this morning. Yeah, I mean, it's relief really, isn't it, Sean? I'm just looking at the Nikkei in Japan. That's up about 5%. The KOSPI in South Korea, 6%. And, you know, we've spoken quite a lot about how all this oil and gas stuck near the Strait of Hormuz. Pretty much all of it is bound for Asian countries, countries here, you know, bringing in fuel rationing, working from home, getting worried, really.

29:27You know, that physical supplies might, you know, start to really, really be dwindling. So this ceasefire announcement will have brought a lot of relief with the caveat. at, and I'm sure you've been speaking about it all morning, Sean, that we are talking about two weeks here. So yes, it's good for supplies. And presuming, and this is a big presumption, but presuming the ceasefire hold and the peace deal is eventually reached, it doesn't mean that Middle Eastern oil production is just going to resume to what it was to pre-war levels overnight. It's going to take months and months for Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates and what have you, to get back to that pre-war level, because that's the nature of oil production.

30:11So in that intervening time, oil prices are still going to stay high. We're still talking about$94 a barrel for Brent crude right now. Yeah, it's a lot less than it was yesterday, but it's still much higher than it was before the war. So we really should, no matter what happens, even best case scenario, expect oil prices to remain pretty high, which I'm talking about Asia here, but it's not really good for anyone when it comes to the cost of living. Nick, thank you for your time this morning. Nick Marsh, our business correspondent in Singapore. Ian, the expectations that we've heard this morning, we've heard in recent weeks that this doesn't necessarily mean that everything will just go back to normal, even as and when we hear of a ceasefire.

30:57How does that change what might happen in your pubs in the coming weeks yeah i mean again it's unpredictability which you don't know how long something will last for how that will filter down to the prices that you pay what adjustments you've got to make for that and how long you've got to price that in that's the stuff which it's it's you know you're gonna have to take that kind of week by week day by day month by month it is very very difficult to be able to say um you've just got to obviously just make sure your business is robust as as possible in order to um you know in order to you know either absorb those extra costs or or to make those adjustments potentially things like kind of opening hours um uh switching out different types of products um that you know i mean as i said before that's one thing if we're to anything, we're used to shocks over the last few years.