Oil prices continue to decline

Oil prices continue to decline amid fears of a global economic slowdown, intensified after statements by Federal Reserve (Fed) Chairman Jerome Powell. Powell, who appeared before the Senate Banking Committee the previous day, said the Fed’s battle with high inflation would require a rate hike high enough to trigger a recession in the U.S. economy.

“An economic slowdown carries risks to oil demand and this should alleviate the supply shortage in the market,” said Warren Patterson, a commodities analyst at ING Groep NV in Singapore. “We’re already seeing experts’ forecasts for demand coming down,” Bloomberg news agency quoted the expert as saying.

There is no consensus among analysts on the prospects for oil demand at the moment. Thus, experts of Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) note that demand still exceeds supply, and the Fed “cannot print commodities”. Citi, meanwhile, predicts a drop in demand by the end of this year and next year.

Data from the American Petroleum Institute (API) released on Wednesday showed a 5.607 million barrel increase in U.S. crude inventories for the week ended June 17.

Official data on reserves will be released by the U.S. Department of Energy on Thursday at 18:00 Moscow time. Experts surveyed by S&P Global Insights, on average, forecast a decline in oil reserves last week by 3.7 million barrels, an increase in gasoline stocks by 500 thousand barrels, distillates – by 600 thousand barrels.

The cost of August futures for Brent crude oil on the London-based ICE Futures exchange by 8:33 Moscow time on Thursday is $110.10 per barrel, which is $1.64 (1.47%) below the price at the close of the previous session. At the end of trading on Wednesday, these contracts fell by $2.91 (2.5%) to $111.74 per barrel.

The price of WTI oil futures for August at the electronic trading of the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) by this time decreased by $1.83 (1.72%) – to $104.36 per barrel. By the close of the market on Wednesday, the cost of these contracts decreased by $3.33 (3%), to $106.19 per barrel.


Notice: ob_end_flush(): failed to send buffer of zlib output compression (0) in /home2/xwealths/public_html/wp-includes/functions.php on line 5349