Oil prices slip as economic worries offset tightening supplies (updated)

Big Sky Industrial

12/07/2021 05:53

* G20 warns COVID-19 variants threaten global economic
growth
    * U.S. add oil, natural gas rigs for a second week in a row
- data

 (Updates prices)
    By Florence Tan
    SINGAPORE, July 12 (Reuters) - Crude futures slipped on
Monday as concerns over slowing global growth outweighed the
prospect of tightening supply after talks among key producers to
raise output in coming months stalled.
    Brent crude  LCOc1  for September fell 35 cents, or 0.5%, to
$75.20 a barrel by 0641 GMT while U.S. West Texas Intermediate
crude  CLc1  for August was at $74.23 a barrel, down 33 cents,
or 0.4%.
    The spread of coronavirus variants and unequal access to
vaccines threaten the global economic recovery, finance chiefs
of the G20 large economies warned on Saturday.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL1N2OM01Q
    A Reuters tally of new COVID-19 infections shows them rising
in 69 countries, with the daily rate pointing upwards since
late-June and now hitting 478,000. https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-maps/
    "We've not yet seen the impact but at this rate, it will hit
demand sooner or later," a Singapore-based oil trader said.
    Oil prices slumped last Tuesday after the Organization of
the Petroleum Exporting Countries and their allies, a group
known as OPEC+, did not reach an agreement to increase output
from August. This was because the United Arab Emirates rejected
a proposed eight-month extension to OPEC+ output curbs.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N2OH0HA
    "Prices are going to stay volatile for as long as the
impasse remains," said Howie Lee, an economist at Singapore's
OCBC bank.
    "On the surface it looks like it should support prices, but
the risk remains that a complete breakdown will result in a
price war not dissimilar to last year," he said, but added that
the probability of the latter event was low.
    The world's top oil exporter Saudi Arabia met full
contractual demand for crude oil from five buyers in August, but
turned down at least two requests for additional volumes.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2OO0Y3
    Front-month WTI crude futures posted their sixth weekly gain
last week after a bullish report from the U.S. Energy
Information Administration showed U.S. crude and gasoline stocks
fell while gasoline demand reached its highest since 2019.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N2OK1MP
    In response to higher oil prices, U.S. energy firms added
oil and natural gas rigs for a second week in a row, data from
Baker Hughes showed.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N2OL1O6

    

 (Editing by Kim Coghill and Jacqueline Wong, editing by Louise
Heavens)
 ((Florence.Tan@thomsonreuters.com; Reuters Messaging:
florence.tan.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))