Case Study: Crude Oil Price Volatility During the Russia Ukraine War

Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February 2022, and Brent crude crossed $100 a barrel the same day for the first time since 2014. Within two weeks it touched nearly $140 intraday, then gave back most of the move just as fast. For India, which imports the large majority of the crude it refines, this was not a distant headline. It showed up in petrol pump prices, in excise duty cuts and a new windfall tax, in a rupee that slid past 80 to the dollar, in the RBI's first rate hike cycle in years, and in sharply diverging moves between upstream producers, refiners and oil marketing companies on NSE. This case study rebuilds the episode step by step: how crude is priced and why India is so exposed, the day by day shock of early 2022, how sanctions and discounted Russian barrels rewired India's import basket, and how each transmission channel hit Indian investors. It closes with a practical playbook for experienced investors and HNIs: measuring commodity volatility, what MCX margin changes mean for leveraged positions, which portfolio hedges actually worked, and how to think before reacting to the next geopolitical oil shock.