Oil prices increased on Thursday

International benchmarks for oil prices increased on Thursday (2 June) after two straight loosing sessions after the US Department of Energy released report on the country’s commercial crude and petroleum products inventories in the past week. The report indicated some 1.4 million barrels drawdown in commercial crude inventories, plus with market’s interpretation of Saudi Arabia comment that it would not flood the market with additional quantities of oil help to push prices up. Many analysts are not seeing any fundamental change in supply-demand dynamics in spite of positive comment from major oil producers, and that the big question is how much more upside can market potentially see.

WTI closed at $49.17/barrel (+$0.16) July delivery

Brent closed at $50.04/barrel (+$0.32) August delivery