Prices for oil of benchmark grades are rising weakly in trading on Thursday.
A day earlier, the market showed the most significant decline in more than a month, despite a record reduction in fuel inventories in the U.S. last week.
Quotes for October Brent crude futures on the London-based ICE Futures exchange as of 7:58 KV are at $83.26 per barrel, up $0.06 (0.07%) from the previous session’s closing price. On Wednesday, these contracts fell $1.71 (2%) to $83.2 per barrel.
The price of WTI crude oil futures for September at the electronic trading of the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) in the morning rose by $0.04 (0.05%) to $79.53 per barrel. At the end of the previous session they fell in price by $1.88 (by 2.3%) – to $79.49 per barrel.
Oil reserves in the U.S. last week decreased by 17.049 million barrels – to 439.77 million barrels, reported the country’s Department of Energy. Gasoline reserves increased by 1.48 million barrels, distillates – decreased by 796 thousand barrels.
Analysts surveyed by S&P Global Commodity Insights on average had forecast a 3.7 million barrel decline in oil reserves, a 1 million barrel decline in gasoline and a 400,000 barrel decline in distillates.
“Oil prices have fallen as the macroeconomic backdrop is killing sentiment,” believes Edward Moya, senior analyst at Oanda, implying, among other things, a downgrade of the US credit rating by Fitch. Also weighing on the oil market is the strong dollar, he told MarketWatch.
According to Matt Smith, lead oil analyst for the Americas at Kpler, the combination of robust oil exports and refinery activity has led to the sharpest decline in U.S. oil inventories on record, he said. “The peak of summer refining coincided with very strong exports at the end of the month, and we shouldn’t expect such large” changes in reserves in the future, he believes.
