By Srinivas Chowdary Sunkara // petrobazaar // 23th April 2020.
Brent oil prices for June delivery rose $2.48 or 12.175% at $22.85 on London based ICE Futures Europe exchange. WTI oil futures to be delivered in June climbed $4.15 or 30 pct at $17.93 a barrel on NYMEX. Brent closed 5.38% up while U.S crude prices mounted 19.1% last night. In Shanghai, crude oil main contract futures rose by 18.1 Yuan or 8.08% to close at 242.2 Yuan/barrel while MCX crude oil May futures are trading 50% high at Rs.1400 at the time of reporting. Brent premium over WTI narrowed down to $4.76 a barrel during today's session.
The world oil crude oil benchmark price indices are rallying more than 50% high spurred by Trump's threat to Iran gun boats that would escalate middle east tensions. The street is eyeing on the supply cuts and expected deep cuts from supplier's group. The rally was driven by the optimism that the U.S relief fund would help to mitigate the financial risk sparked by COVID-19 in U.S..
Turning to weekly data, EIA reported that U.S stocks built up by 15 Mbpd. Gasoline and distillates stocks were piled up by 1Mbpd and 7.9Mbpd respectively. The production numbers stood at 12.2Mbpd, down by 1Mbpd during the last week. U.S crude imports slowed to 4.9Mbpd last week from 6.5Mbpd five weeks earlier, One of the fastest decline in the last decade. The total volume of petroleum products supplied to the domestic market averaged 14.1Mbpd in the week ending on April 17th. In response to lower demand, U.S refiners cut crude processing to 12.5Mbpd last week, down from 15.8 Mbpd five weeks ago. In brief, U.S petroleum consumption has fallen by a third since the economy went into lockdown in March but showed signs of stabilizing last week according to the weekly report.
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