Expert: Market Needs Wait-and-See Approach to Hormuz Strait Closure

RRI.CO.ID, Jakarta - The market needs to stay calm and take wait-and-see approach to the closure of Hormuz Strait in Iran. That was stated by economist Irfan Syauqi Beik in an interview with RRI Voice of Indonesia on Tuesday (3/3/2026).

"That is what they need to do, not directly shifting the capital from emerging market like Indonesia towards the safe haven assets," Irfan conveyed. The mentioned safe haven assets were gold and foreign currency such as US dollar.

According to him, the impact of Hormuz Strait being closed already affected Indonesian financial market, in which the Jakarta Composite Index experienced some correction. However, Irfan believed the impact was still moderate and not a systemic one.

On the other hand, Irfan saw the government need to show the investors that mitigation is underway. This move was deemed necessary, following the investors' lack of confidence due to the recent MSCI case.

More specifically, he plead the government to prevent imported inflation while monitoring the capital market. Then, the profit taking activities must be strictly observed to prevent free-riders from taking advantage of the situation.

In the same interview, Irfan who is also the dean of IPB University's Faculty of Economics and Management explained the closure of Hormuz Strait affected Indonesia in three channels. Apart from the financial market, the other two channels were oil price and sentiment channel.

The sentiment, stemming from the global uncertainty, made the markets more sensitive than ever. Irfan based this on the World Uncertainty Index.

"It shows an increasing trend, for the past three year... and stimulated by various geopolitical conflicts, including military conflict that have taken place, especially in the Middle East," he explained.

This sentiment, according to Irfan, made them reacting excessively. Result of this excessive reaction was the increasing market volatility.