geopolitics

Brent crude closed at $60.56 on Friday, its biggest weekly decline in more than a year as concerns that the coronavirus will spread farther in China, curbing oil demand.

Oil prices inched up a bit last week with Brent closing just below $65 a barrel after the US and Iran thought better of going to war.  Attention then shifted to the signing of the first phase of a US-China trade deal and the slowing Chinese economy.

Brent futures slipped to below $65 a barrel on Friday as the threat of war in the Middle East receded, and investors focused on rising US inventories and other signs of ample supply.  WTI closed at $59 a barrel.

Brent crude futures jumped nearly $3 a barrel on Friday after a US airstrike killed top Iranian and Iraqi military commanders in Baghdad.  Brent crude futures hit an intraday high of $69.16 a barrel, their highest since Sept 17th, before easing down to $68.60, up $2.35 for the day.  West Texas Intermediate futures were up $1.85 or 3.04 percent to $63.05 a barrel, having earlier spiked to $63.84 a barrel, their highest since May 1.

Oil rose on Friday to its highest in nearly three months as progress in resolving the US-China trade dispute was announced, and a decisive Tory win in Britain’s general election appeared to settle two uncertainties that have plagued the markets for months.

Oil prices rose on Friday, closing at $59.08 in N.Y. and $64.31 in London, up about 7 percent for the week. The surge came as a meeting of OPEC and its allies agreed to deepen output cuts by 500,000 b/d in early 2020.

US crude futures fell 5.1 percent to $55.17 a barrel in New York last Friday, paring most of their November rebound and logging their biggest drop since mid-September.  Prices are 17 percent below their April peaks.  Brent dropped 2.3 percent to $63.43 a barrel on Friday after edging lower on Thursday when US markets were closed for Thanksgiving.

Crude futures climbed by over $3 a barrel in the first four days of last week but settled lower Friday as unease over the status of US-China trade talks increased at the end of a week that saw prices reach their highest level since September.  

US futures fluctuated between $56 and $57.50 last week as stockpiles rose, the rig count dropped, and hopes for a breakthrough in the US-China trade negotiations kept coming and going.  Brent rose above $63 a barrel on Thursday after China hinted at progress towards a trade deal with the United States.

On Wednesday, the price of oil came under pressure after the EIA reported a crude oil inventory build of 5.7 million barrels for the week to October 25.  Analysts had expected a much smaller build of 729,000 barrels after a 1.7-million-barrel draw interrupted a string of five weekly inventory builds.

Prices were up about $2 last week on an unexpected drawdown in US crude stocks and rumors that OPEC+ is considering another production cut.  Forecasters see a supply glut continuing in 2020 due to slowing economies and growth in US shale oil production.

Oil prices slipped last week with Brent down 1.8 percent to close at $59.42.  WTI closed $53.82, down 1.7 percent.  Concerns increased about China’s economy, which slowed to 6 percent year-over-year growth in the third quarter, the slowest growth in 27-1/2 years.