Believe it or not, crude oil is actually up for the fifth consecutive day now. Despite on-going bearish news flow and downbeat sentiment, oil prices appear stable ahead of the official US weekly crude inventories data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) later this afternoon.
Commodities price are firmer today with base and especially precious metals ending a bad run off losses, while crude oil has extended its gains from the day before when it rallied sharply on the back of the weekly US oil inventories report.
Crude prices jumped in reaction to the latest weekly US crude stockpiles data but then quickly went into reverse gear, before bounce back once again.
Oil prices have been extremely volatile of late, without making any significant progress in either direction. The long and short of it is that the stream of mostly negative news has helped to halt the recent rally, while ahead of this month’s informal meeting of the OPEC in Algeria not many people will want to be betting boldly on an oil price plunge. Therefore consolidation is the dominant theme in
As Cushing supplies decline due to increased logistic options out of the storage hub in the Midwest PADD 2 in Cushing, Oklahoma inventories are rising to elevated levels in the Gulf Coast which eventually will provide the bottleneck and back up oil flows all along the supply and logistics chain.
In reviewing the EIA weekly petroleum report, the oil imports figure came in at 6.889 (Million Barrels per Day) for the week ending 01/10/14. This number compared to a year ago 8.030 (Million Barrels per Day) puts a nice cap on the downtrend which really started gaining steam in 2010 onward.
WTI is showing difficulty in trading above the $94.00/bbl price level, while Brent is doing the same near $113.00/bbl. The oil markets may continue to remain range-bound in the near-term, as influencing factors are somewhat mixed. The upside will focus on improving economic data, buying by managed money accounts, and fresh refinery issues with Motiva
It’s difficult to say that yesterday’s rally and breakout above the 50-day MA in WTI and Brent will create an environment of bullish euphoria in the near-term, because the same conditions have played themselves out several times in the last two months.
Daily Energy Report – The oil markets may trade higher again in the near-term, however, the fundamental picture still remains somewhat weak at the moment.
Oil prices may fall slightly in the near-term, as pressure is offered by technical factors and the lack of progress in fiscal cliff negotiations. Background pressure will come from next week’s OPEC meeting where quotas are expected to be left unchanged, and from the growing amount of U.S. oil production.
