According to online source Finanz, the U.S. crude oil inventories shrank over the past week, which pushed oil prices higher. After 3 weeks of retracing, crude oil is rallying confidently again. The Brent oil futures for January delivery reached $63,29/b, which is 1,15% higher than a day before. At the same time, The WTI oil futures for January delivery gained more than 2% and reached $57,94/b, which is the highest level since July 2015.
According to NordFX experts, the prices started going up shortly after the API released its weekly oil report. The report indicated that the crude oil inventories declined by as much as 6,365 million barrels over the reporting period. This was the highest weekly drop since August 2017, and it was triggered by an excessive demand.
At the same time, some experts believe that if the U.S. Department of Energy confirms the API’s figures, Brent oil may well reach 65-68 dollars per barrel in the coming days.
As you probably know, we are getting closer to the OPEC summit in Vienna scheduled for November 30th. This is going to be a major event deciding the near-term future of the entire international market of crude oil. The thing is, the participants are going to decide the fate of the so-called OPEC+ agreement. For now, they are going to extend the deal at least for the 1st quarter of 2018. Some participants suggest extending the deal all the way up to the end of 2018. Some experts report that international traders and investors have already loaded up on oil futures (billions of dollars) as they expect the OPEC+ deal to be extended for the entire 2018. If this is not the case, we are probably going to see massive sellouts.
