Iran has announced that it shipped more than seven million barrels of crude oil in only two days thus setting a new record in the country’s oil exports not seen in several years.
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Stocks on Wall Street looked set for a positive open on Thursday amid rising oil prices, as investors looked to the release of some key data.
Traders surveyed by Bloomberg had originally forecast a 3.5 million barrel gain in inventories.
USA oil futures ended Thursday trading higher, after US government data showed a rise in crude stockpiles.
Refinery crude runs rose 338,000 bpd, EIA data showed as refinery utilization rates rose by 2.2 percentage points to 88.3 percent of capacity.
Strengthening oil prices helped to lift the mood, with West Texas Intermediate up 3.3% at $31.66 a barrel and Brent crude 2.6% firmer at $35.38.
Top oil producers Russian Federation and Saudi Arabia on Tuesday agreed to freeze oil production at January levels, provided other oil exporters joined in, but stopped short of agreeing cuts in oil output.
Oil futures are down almost 70% since the summer of 2014. The 7 percent gain is being viewed as a market overreaction to headlines yesterday that Iran supported the January-level output freeze, but has not committed to an output cap itself and is unlikely to as it seeks to increase its own production by 500,000-fresh off sanctions. Zanganeh didn’t mention if Iran, the second-biggest OPEC producer before sanctions were intensified in 2012, would deviate from plans to boost exports after the lifting of restrictions last month. “It appears that the price requires an astounding catalyst to break above this level and the upcoming crude inventory data due today could provide this”. Sources familiar with Iranian thinking have said this week that Iran would not freeze output at current levels.
“What we see still is extreme volatility”, said Carsten Fritsch, analyst at Commerzbank.
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USA crude supplies fell by 3.26 million barrels last week, the industry-funded American Petroleum Institute was said to report yeserday.
