AGL 40.00 No Change ▼ 0.00 (0%)
AIRLINK 130.50 Increased By ▲ 0.97 (0.75%)
BOP 6.68 No Change ▼ 0.00 (0%)
CNERGY 4.65 Increased By ▲ 0.02 (0.43%)
DCL 9.00 Increased By ▲ 0.06 (0.67%)
DFML 43.30 Increased By ▲ 1.61 (3.86%)
DGKC 83.81 Increased By ▲ 0.04 (0.05%)
FCCL 32.98 Increased By ▲ 0.21 (0.64%)
FFBL 78.31 Increased By ▲ 2.84 (3.76%)
FFL 11.59 Increased By ▲ 0.12 (1.05%)
HUBC 110.66 Increased By ▲ 0.11 (0.1%)
HUMNL 14.51 Decreased By ▼ -0.05 (-0.34%)
KEL 5.42 Increased By ▲ 0.03 (0.56%)
KOSM 8.42 Increased By ▲ 0.02 (0.24%)
MLCF 39.79 No Change ▼ 0.00 (0%)
NBP 60.80 Increased By ▲ 0.51 (0.85%)
OGDC 198.60 Decreased By ▼ -1.06 (-0.53%)
PAEL 26.66 Increased By ▲ 0.01 (0.04%)
PIBTL 7.77 Increased By ▲ 0.11 (1.44%)
PPL 159.20 Increased By ▲ 1.28 (0.81%)
PRL 26.54 Decreased By ▼ -0.19 (-0.71%)
PTC 18.75 Increased By ▲ 0.29 (1.57%)
SEARL 83.10 Increased By ▲ 0.66 (0.8%)
TELE 8.40 Increased By ▲ 0.09 (1.08%)
TOMCL 34.52 Increased By ▲ 0.01 (0.03%)
TPLP 9.10 Increased By ▲ 0.04 (0.44%)
TREET 17.30 Decreased By ▼ -0.17 (-0.97%)
TRG 61.90 Increased By ▲ 0.58 (0.95%)
UNITY 27.43 Decreased By ▼ -0.01 (-0.04%)
WTL 1.39 Increased By ▲ 0.01 (0.72%)
BR100 10,407 No Change 0 (0%)
BR30 31,713 No Change 0 (0%)
KSE100 97,972 Increased By 643.2 (0.66%)
KSE30 30,384 Increased By 191.7 (0.63%)
Markets

Oil down, retreats from 3-1/2 year high ahead of US holiday

NEW YORK: Crude prices fell Tuesday, retreating from early gains that had lifted the US benchmark as high as $75 for
Published July 3, 2018

NEW YORK: Crude prices fell Tuesday, retreating from early gains that had lifted the US benchmark as high as $75 for the first time in more than three years, which prompted traders with bullish positions to book some profits ahead of the July 4 US holiday.

US light crude dropped 94 cents to $73.00 a barrel by 11:35 a.m. EDT (1535 GMT), after hitting $75.27, a 3-1/2-year high. Benchmark Brent crude was down 31 cents at $76.96 a barrel after briefly touching a session low of $76.67 a barrel. Early in the session, Brent traded as high as $78.55 a barrel.

The early gains came after Iran appeared to threaten to disrupt oil shipments from the Middle East Gulf if Washington pressed ahead with sanctions. US crude rose above $75 a barrel for the first time since 2014.

But the market pulled back as some thought talk of supply disruptions might be overblown, said Gene McGillian, vice president of market research at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut. He also said traders could be moving to liquidate bullish positions.

Pressure to liquidate may have accelerated ahead of the US holiday on Wednesday, said Tariq Zahir, managing member at Tyche Capital in New York.

Traders said supply disruptions could be short lived. They noted that OPEC and allies are ramping up output, while a production facility in Canada might restarts ahead of schedule or US President Donald Trump might order oil released from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

Production at Syncrude Canada's 360,000 barrels per day (bpd) oil sands facility near Fort McMurray, Alberta, was hit by a power outage last month and is likely to remain offline through July.

Oil's early gains came after the website president.ir quoted Iranian President Hassan Rouhani as dismissing Washington's attempt to stop iran's oil exports "because it has no meaning for Iranian oil not to be exported, while the region's oil is exported."

While the comments were ambiguous, Iranian officials in the past have threatened to block the Strait of Hormuz, a major oil shipping route, in retaliation for any hostile US action against Iran.

Asked whether he intended to make a threat, Rouhani declined to provide a clarification.

"Just the threat to (the Strait of) Hormuz would add uncertainty and warrant a certain risk premium," Carsten Fritsch, senior commodities analyst at Commerzbank told Reuters Global Oil Forum.

Copyright Reuters, 2018

Comments

Comments are closed.