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.
Offers of Angolan and other West African crude oil to China, a main customer, are a barometer of physical crude demand from the country. China’s Unipec, a major world oil trader, offered for sale several cargoes of crude shipments set to load in December, in a rare sign of slackening interest.
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