At a two-week high the oil closed

Oil prices closed with gains on Wednesday, finding support from a series of news indications that the Omicron mutation may not upset economies as much as the market is worried.

In particular, the results of an “initial laboratory study” announced by Pfizer and BioNTech today showed that their covid-19 vaccine neutralizes the Omicron mutation after three or two doses and the booster.

The conclusions of Pfizer and BioNTech broadly confirmed the preliminary study by the Africa Health Research Institute in South Africa. The institute’s researchers announced yesterday that Omicron may partially escape the protection offered by the two doses of the Pfizer – BioNTech vaccine, adding that a third dose is likely to help treat the highly mutated strain.

Meanwhile, yesterday GlaxoSmithKline announced that the antibody therapy against Covid-19 that it has developed with the American Vir Biotechnology is effective against all mutations of the new Omicron strain, according to the latest preclinical studies.

“Traders are beginning to realize that Ομικρον“While it may cause some slowdown in oil demand, it will not be as catastrophic as it was feared,” Phil Flynn, an analyst at The Price Futures Group, told MarketWatch.

“Black gold” prices fell to negative territory intra-conference in the wake of data showing a Mild weekly decline in US crude stockpiles and one higher than expected increase in stocks of gasoline and spirits.

In particular, the Energy Information Service (EIA) announced on Wednesday a smaller-than-expected 200,000-barrel drop in U.S. inventories for the week ending Dec. 3. This was the second consecutive weekly decline, as EIA data showed a drop of 900,000 barrels for the week ended November 26.

On average, however, analysts had forecast a bigger drop of 1.2 million barrels in the last week, according to a poll by S&P Global Platts. The American Petroleum Institute reported a drop of 3.1 million barrels on Tuesday, according to sources.

The data also showed that US inventories fell by 1.7 million barrels to 600.9 million barrels last week, while total domestic oil reserves increased by 100,000 barrels to 11.7 million barrels per day. Crude stockpiles at the Nymex delivery hub in Cushing, Oklahoma, rose 2.4 million barrels a week.

The EIA also reported a weekly increase in inventories of 3.9 million barrels for petrol and 2.7 million barrels for spirits. The S&P Global Platts survey expected inventories to increase by 1.4 million barrels for gasoline and 900,000 barrels for spirits.

Despite the mild data, oil prices rose “indicating that the sell-off in energy markets after Thanksgiving amid concerns about the Omicron mutation was excessive,” said Tyler Richey, co-publisher of Sevens Report Research.

In the meantime, his decision OPEC+ to open the December session also introduced an “OPEC + put” on the market, with speculators “reluctant to sell from this position knowing that the cartel could act at any time to support prices in the coming weeks”, he said.

In this climate, the West Texas Intermediate January delivery rose 31 cents, or 0.4%, to settle at $ 72.36 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the highest level since Nov. 24, according to FactSet.

The Brent oil February delivery added 32 cents, or 0.4%, to close at $ 75.76 a barrel on the ICE Futures Europe benchmark for the fourth straight session.