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Crude oil added to recent gains on Friday to cap a fourth winning week out of five, benefiting from rising tensions in the Middle East and outperforming some tough stocks along the way.
During the week, US inventories increased by 12 million barrels in the largest weekly increase since november, the The IEA said Global oil demand growth is losing momentum as supplies outside of OPEC+ continue to rise, and two hotter-than-expected U.S. inflation reports have lifted the dollar and reduced any chance of an early rate cut by of the Federal Reserve.
A larger-than-expected drop in U.S. retail sales kept hopes of a rate cut alive, but economists warned that results were likely to be slowed by the extreme cold snap in mid-January.
Bloomberg’s Grant Smith noted that time spreads for both the WTI benchmark and Brent are signaling tight conditions, which he believes suggests the market can support prices at current levels, barring any major supply shocks .
According to a Bloomberg seasonal analysis of the 10-year average of Brent crude oil, oil prices tend to see a modest increase of 1.4% in the first quarter; earnings in the current quarter are about 5.5% so far.
Bullish sentiment is growing among some prominent oil market watchers: Standard Chartered says Brent prices should be above $90 a barrel given poor growth in oil inventories last month, JP Morgan expects oil to rise by more $10 by May and Morgan Stanley has cited surprisingly restrictive conditions to raise its price. price forecast.
Front-month Nymex crude (CL1:COM) for March delivery is out +1.5% Friday at $79.19 a barrel, the highest since Nov. 6, and first-month April Brent crude (CO1:COM) closed +0.7% at 83.47 dollars a barrel; Over the course of the week, WTI jumped 3% and Brent 1.5%.
US natural gas (NG1:COM) has fallen for four of the last five weeks, to top it off +1.7% on the day, but fell 12.9% on the week to $1.609/MMBtu, the second lowest value of the year.
ETFs: (NYSEARCA:USE), (BNO), (UCO), (SCO), (USL), (DBO), (DRIP), (GUSH), (NRGU), (USOI), (UNG), (BOIL), (COLD), (UNL), (FCG)
Oil and gas stocks, represented by the Energy Select Sector SPDR (NYSEARCA:XLE), finished +1.5% for the week.
Top 5 gains in energy and natural resources in the last 5 days: Fusion Fuel Green (HTOO) +105.4%Green Clean Fuels (VGAS) +95.4%New World Graphite (NMG) +43.3%Metamaterials (MMAT) +38.1%DNANOW (DNANOW) +25.1%.
Top 5 declining countries in terms of energy and natural resources in the last 5 days: SSR Mining (SSRM) -48.6%Fluence Energy (FLNC) -14.6%Flowering Energy (BE) -14.3%Global Gas (HGAS) -13.2%Encore Energy (EU) -11.3%.
Source: Barchart.com