West Texas Intermediate crude headed for a sixth weekly gain as freezing weather in the U.S. bolstered demand for heating fuels in the world’s biggest oil consumer. Brent is also poised to advance for the week.
Futures were little changed in New York and up 2.4 percent this week. Distillate stockpiles, including heating oil and diesel, declined by 339,000 barrels to 112.7 million in the seven days through Feb. 14, the Energy Information Administration reported yesterday. South Sudan is trying to evacuate foreign oil workers from its Upper Nile region after fighting erupted between government forces and rebel fighters.
“Following somewhat milder temperatures in the U.S. of late, temperatures are forecast to plummet again next week,” Carsten Fritsch, an analyst at Commerzbank AG in Frankfurt, said by e-mail. “After that the weather should normalize. Based on fundamentals, prices are too high.”
WTI for April delivery dropped 23 cents to $102.52 a barrel as of 1:22 p.m. London time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The March contract expired yesterday after losing 39 cents to $102.92. The volume of all futures traded was about 37 percent below the 100-day average. Prices have increased 4 percent this year.
Brent for April settlement traded 25 cents lower at $110.05 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. Prices are up 0.9 percent this week. The European benchmark crude was at a premium of $7.53 to WTI on ICE, little changed from $7.55 yesterday.
via Bloomberg
Content is for general information purposes only. It is not investment advice or a solution to buy or sell securities. Opinions are the authors; not necessarily that of OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc. or any of its affiliates, subsidiaries, officers or directors. If you would like to reproduce or redistribute any of the content found on MarketPulse, an award winning forex, commodities and global indices analysis and news site service produced by OANDA Business Information & Services, Inc., please access the RSS feed or contact us at info@marketpulse.com. Visit https://www.marketpulse.com/ to find out more about the beat of the global markets. © 2023 OANDA Business Information & Services Inc.
Alfonso Esparza
trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Latest posts by Alfonso Esparza (see all)
- Market Rally Still Going Low Holiday Volumes Awaiting Start of 2020 - 27 December 2019
- Market Awaits China Retaliation on Trade - 29 November 2019
- Alibaba to Close Order Book Ahead of Huge IPO - 18 November 2019