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Oil futures rose Wednesday, clawing back some of the previous session’s steep fall, as supply worries proved persistent.
Price action
-
West Texas Intermediate crude for May delivery
CL.1,
+1.51% CLK22,
+1.51%
rose 98 cents, or 1%, to $103.54 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The most actively traded June contract
CL00,
+1.49% CLM22,
+1.49%
was up $1.12, or 1%, at $108.37 a barrel. -
June Brent crude
BRN00,
+1.32% BRNM22,
+1.32% ,
the global benchmark, was up $1.14, or 1.1%, at $108.39 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe. Brent and WTI futures both fell more than 5% on Tuesday.
Market drivers
The American Petroleum Institute late Tuesday reported that U.S. crude supplies fell by 4.5 million barrels for the week ended April 15, according to sources. The API also reportedly showed a weekly inventory climb of 2.9 million barrels for gasoline, while distillate stockpiles declined by nearly 1.7 million barrels.
Inventory data from the Energy Information Administration will be released Wednesday. Marshall Steeves, energy markets analyst at S&P Global Commodity Insights, said the EIA is expected to show crude inventories up by 2.2 million barrels for the week, along with supply declines of 1.2 million barrels for gasoline and 1 million barrels for distillates.
Tuesday’s selloff was sparked by a significant downward revision of the growth forecast by the International Monetary Fund, said Carsten Fritsch, commodity analyst at Commerzbank, in a note. The IMF now sees global economic growth of just 3.6% in 2022, compared with its January prediction of 4.4%, citing worries over inflation and the Russia-Ukraine war while predicting slower activity in China due to COVID-19 lockdowns.
“All of this is fueling concerns about demand on the oil market, which had recently taken somewhat more of a back seat as supply risks dominated the headlines,” Fritsch wrote.
