(New York) Oil prices ended lower Thursday, signing their first monthly decline since November, on a market increasingly concerned about the deteriorated health of the economy, illustrated by a new American indicator.
Updated yesterday at 5:41 p.m.
North Sea Brent crude for August delivery fell 1.27% to close at $114.81. In June, it lost 6.5%.
As for the barrel of American West Texas Intermediate (WTI), also with maturity in August, it dropped 3.66%, to 105.76 dollars. It ended the month down 7.7%.
“The easy first-half market that everyone liked,” with prices steadily rising irresistibly, “has disappeared, driven by more mixed fundamentals,” Edward Moya, D. ‘Oanda.
While supply remains constrained, primarily by the war in Ukraine and the sanctions imposed on Russia, demand is showing signs of fatigue.
The PCE indicator showed on Thursday that consumption had barely increased in May (+0.2%) in the United States, much less than expected by economists (+0.6%).
Edward Moya again recalled the figures published on Wednesday by the American Energy Information Agency (EIA), with a demand for gasoline, over the past two weeks, below the symbolic threshold of 9 million barrels per day, lower than last year’s level, “despite good weather”.
“There are also probably position adjustments, because it’s the end of the quarter, with profit taking,” said Matt Smith of Kpler. “But little has changed on the merits,” he argues, anticipating sustained demand for refined products, gasoline in particular.
In the United States, prices at the pump continue to fall, and have fallen by 3% since the historic peak in mid-June, significantly less than that of crude oil, however.
Operators were not sensitive to the announcement by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies of the OPEC+ agreement, which decided on Thursday to raise, as planned, their overall production by 648,000 barrels per day in August.
They have not, however, made any commitment for the future. The market was hoping for clarification after several cartel officials acknowledged that the remaining unused capacity was very modest.
“It was a non-event,” according to Matt Smith.
In the United States, the price of natural gas faltered again on Thursday, falling back to its level of three months ago.
Since its peak in early June, it has erased 43% of its value. A movement mainly due to the closure of the gas terminal in Freeport, Texas, which deprived the United States of approximately 15% of its export capacity and flooded the American market with additional gas volumes.
The EIA said U.S. natural gas inventories jumped 2.3 million cubic meters to their highest level in nearly six months.