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London - Oil climbed above $50 a barrel in London for the first time in six weeks after further declines in US crude and gasoline inventories eased concerns over a global glut.
Brent advanced as much as 0.7%. US crude inventories slipped 4.73 million barrels last week, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported on Wednesday. Gasoline stockpiles dropped by 4.45 million barrels, the most since March.
Oil had traded below $50 since the start of June amid concerns rising global supply will offset curbs by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries and its partners.
OPEC and non-member countries will meet later this month in St. Petersburg to help monitor compliance with the output deal.
“This is a perfect demonstration that the oil market rebalancing process is actually happening,” Jan Edelmann, an analyst at HSH Nordbank in Hamburg, said of the inventory declines.
US supplies
Brent for September settlement traded at $50.03 a barrel, up 33 cents, on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange at 14:12, climbing above $50 for the first time since June 7. Prices on Wednesday gained 86c to close at $49.70. The global benchmark crude traded at a premium of $2.42 to September West Texas Intermediate.
WTI for August delivery, which expires Thursday, was up 24c to $47.36 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Total volume traded was about 14% below the 100-day average. Prices advanced 72 cents to settle at $47.12 on Wednesday. The more-active September contract added 26c to $47.58.
Crude stockpiles at Cushing, Oklahoma, the delivery point for WTI and the nation’s biggest oil-storage hub, fell for a ninth week to 57.5 million barrels last week, the longest run of declines since June 2014, EIA data showed. Still, US production expanded for a third week to 9.43 million barrels a day in the week ended July 14, according to the EIA.
Oil-market news:
Iraq is proceeding with plans to boost output to 5 million barrels a day by the end of the year, including from the Kurdistan region, Oil Minister Jabbar Al-Luaibi said.
India approved the sale of a $4.6bn stake in state-run refiner Hindustan Petroleum to the country’s biggest oil and gas explorer, according to a person with knowledge of the decision. Kuwait plans to increase its light-oil output capacity by 200 000 barrels a day by December, Kuwait Oil Minister Issam Almarzooq said in an emailed statement.
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