Oil prices closed higher on Thursday, recovering a small portion of the significant losses they suffered yesterday, after US inflation data boosted bond yields and the dollar and rekindled worries about a possible “release” of crude oil. Strategic Oil Reserve.
Alongside, OPEC cut its forecast for global oil demand on Thursday for the fourth quarter of 2021 due to high energy prices, although the organization insists on its forecast for strong growth above pre-pandemic rates in 2022.
OPEC said in its monthly report that it expects average oil demand to reach 99.49 million barrels per day in the fourth quarter of 2021, down 330,000 barrels per day from last month’s forecast. Demand forecast for the year fell by 160,000 barrels per day to 5.65 million barrels per day.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said yesterday that U.S. crude stockpiles strengthened by 1 million barrels in the week ended Nov. 5, although the U.S. Petroleum Institute reported a 2.5 million barrel drop in inventories on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, the Strategic Oil Reserve (SPR) fell 3.1 million barrels last week to 609.4 million barrels, according to the EIA, which said the figure “includes non-US stocks held under foreign or commercial storage agreements “.
“Although some of the planned SPR auctions were announced by the United States a long time ago, some falling ‘bells’ were ringing in the trading halls, fueling inflation concerns,” said Bjørnar Tonhaugen, head of oil Energy, stressing that “today the” bulls “of oil are licking their wounds after Wednesday’s sell-off”.
Combined with the annual jump in US inflation, “the market is splitting between the current bottleneck in crude markets and the risks to demand as a result of monetary policy, which is likely to strengthen the dollar and negatively affect the purchasing power of emerging oil markets, “he added.
Today the US dollar climbed to a high of more than 15 months against the euro and other currencies, after strengthening by 0.3% according to the ICE US Dollar.
In this climate, the West Texas Intermediate crude December delivery strengthened 25 cents, or 0.3%, to settle at $ 81.59 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
The Brent oil January delivery added 23 cents, or 0.3 percent, to $ 82.87 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe.
On Thursday, the December delivery contract for natural gas increased by 5.5% to $ 5,149 per 1 million British thermal units.
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