The global oil market is signaling a potential shift, as traders and analysts worry about reduced crude demand and an oversupplied market in the coming months.
After months of strength, crude futures are flirting with lows not seen all year as top oil consumer China enters additional COVID-19 lockdowns while central banks hike interest rates to combat inflation.
The murkier environment comes at a fraught time for the market. On Dec. 5, a European Union ban on Russian crude imports is set to start, along with a plan by the G7 nations to force shippers to comply with a price cap on Russian oil sales. The front-month U.S. crude futures contract traded as low as 38 cents weaker than the second-month contract , the weakest differential since November 2020, Refinitiv Eikon data showed. The front-month contract for the Brent international benchmark traded as low as 6 cents below the second-month , the weakest since August.
Meanwhile, Norway's Equinor this week offered a cargo of Angolan Pazflor crude for a discount of $2.50 a barrel to dated Brent, down more than a dollar in a week. Spot prices for crude out of Oman - a key supplier to China - have fallen to 82 cents over Dubai crude from as high as $15.06 a barrel in early March.Oil storage in several regions is building, said Norbert Rucker, head of economics and next generation research at Swiss wealth manager Julius Baer.
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