Oil prices finished Monday’s volatile session with modest gains as investors continued to weigh the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
The West Texas Intermediate (WTI) for August delivery climbed 22 cents to settle at 40.81 U.S. dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, while Brent crude for September delivery was up 14 cents to close at 43.28 dollars a barrel on the London ICE Futures Exchange.
“Positive and negative factors remain balanced,” Eugen Weinberg, energy analyst at Commerzbank Research, said in a note on Monday.
The very high numbers of new COVID-19 cases around the world could jeopardise the further recovery of oil demand, while the production discipline shown by OPEC+ appeared to be convincing the market, with even the gradual stepping up of production from August tending to be seen more as proof of increased demand than as a potential risk of oversupply, Weinberg noted.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies led by Russia, collectively known as OPEC+, have delivered compliance of 107 percent with their agreed oil output cuts in June, according to the oil group.
OPEC+ decided last week to scale back their record production cuts to 7.7 million barrels per day starting from August.
For the week ending Friday, WTI crude rose 0.1 percent, while Brent declined 0.2 percent. Enditem
