The CEO of Maersk, which ships 14% of everything you buy, said the Iran war is adding $500 million in monthly costs it’s trying not to pass down

A prolonged war in Iran will bump the odds of inflation while simultaneously forcing a slowdown in consumer demand. All of this is troubling for the chief executive of container shipping giant Maersk, who warned that deadly combination is already rocking the global shipping sector.

“The war in the Middle East created a new wake-up call with significant disruptions, both to the flows in and around the Middle East, but also to our energy supply,” CEO Vincent Clerc told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Europe” on Thursday. “We are a highly energy-intensive industry, and that has created a whole new set of circumstances that we now have to deal with, and that will have an important impact on the second and third quarter.”

Maersk is at the forefront of the oil shock, deeply entwined with fuel costs and global logistics, making it a harbinger of what is to come in how the world navigates widespread energy disruptions.

The Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint through which one-fifth of the world’s oil passes, has remained effectively closed for the duration of the war in Iran, sending and keeping oil prices above $100 per barrel. The price was about $105 as of Friday, still elevated above the pre-war $70, as the market attempts to make sense of mixed signals of peace talks between the U.S. and Iran, which coul...