(New York) Oil prices ended lower on Thursday, consolidating after several sessions of gains, in a market concerned about the lack of strength in demand and the uninterrupted accumulation of inventories.
The price of a barrel of Brent North Sea oil for April delivery fell 0.69% to close at $84.50.
As for the barrel of American West Texas Intermediate (WTI), for delivery in March, it fell 0.52% to 78.06 dollars.
“We can talk about consolidation,” commented Robert Yawger, of Mizuho, after a streak that saw Brent and WTI gain more than 6% in the first three sessions of the week.
This decline is also, for the analyst, the continued increase in reserves of crude and refined products in the West.
In the United States, commercial inventories increased last week by 2.4 million barrels, recording, in passing, their seventh consecutive week of increase, an extremely rare series in the middle of winter.
Reserves of gasoline and distillates, which include diesel, have also increased significantly, triple what was expected for the former.
Robert Yawger noted that despite the relatively moderate utilization rate of refineries, at 87.9%, “stocks continue to rise”.
The tanks are also full in Europe. According to Quantum Commodity Intelligence, diesel stocks in the so-called ARA region (Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp) are at their highest since March 2021.
As for the American demand, it remains lower by 8% than last year, that is to say approximately 1.8 million barrels per day for refined products.
For the analyst, the momentum of the last few days had been generated by a massive positioning of speculative interests on the rise, with some of these operators taking profits on Thursday.
The rebound was also due to disruptions in Turkey’s transport of hydrocarbons after the earthquake that hit the country on Monday and killed more than 20,000 people.
The transport of Iraqi crude to the Ceyhan oil terminal has partially resumed since Tuesday, but the transport of Azeri oil remained suspended, the time to carry out the necessary checks even if no major damage was noted on facilities at this stage.
Renewed anxiety about even tougher-than-expected monetary tightening in the United States also dampened the rise in oil prices on Thursday, according to Edward Moya of Oanda.
Several members of the American central bank (Fed) have mentioned, in recent days, a higher key rate than envisaged so far.