Brent crude futures gave up earlier gains in early Asian trading as market concerns about demand growth grew and OPEC cut its global oil demand growth forecast for 2024 and 2025.
As of 12:00 Beijing time, the price of the October contract of Brent crude oil futures was US$81.64 per barrel, down 66 cents from the settlement price on August 12, when the contract closed up US$2.64 from the previous trading day.
The September contract price of WTI crude oil futures was $79.49 per barrel, down 57 cents from the settlement price on August 12, when the contract closed up $3.22 from the previous trading day.
OPEC has lowered its forecast for global oil demand growth in 2024 and 2025 for the first time. In its latest monthly oil market report, it lowered its 2024 demand growth forecast to 2.11 million barrels per day from 2.25 million barrels per day when it was first released in July. OPEC said the adjustment was mainly based on a decline in expectations for China's oil demand growth and actual data in the first half of 2024. China's oil demand is now expected to grow by 70,000 barrels per day this year, a decrease of 60,000 barrels per day from last month's report. At the same time, OPEC also lowered its 2025 oil demand growth forecast by 60,000 barrels per day to 1.78 million barrels per day, mainly due to lower-than-expected consumption growth in the Middle East.
The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden plans to triple the size of the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) crude oil purchase program to take advantage of the recent drop in oil prices. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) said it plans to purchase up to 6 million barrels of crude oil from the SPR's Bryan Mound site between January and March, instead of the smaller 2 million barrels announced last week. The DOE's adjustment in purchase size is based on the consideration that current market conditions are more favorable to taxpayers.
Oman produced 759,800 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil in July, the same as in June, and 80,000 bpd above its OPEC+ production target, according to the Ministry of Energy. Its current target is 759,000 bpd, including a voluntary cut of 42,000 bpd agreed at the OPEC+ ministerial meeting in November last year. Oman produced 100 bpd above its target in May and 400 bpd below it in April. The country exceeded its target by 13,000 bpd in January, 2,900 bpd in February and 500 bpd in March, respectively.
(The above content comes from the latest views of Argus, an independent international energy and commodity price assessment agency)
Article forwarded from: Jinshi Data
