Brent & WTI are pushing higher as we move.......>

OIL: Brent & WTI are pushing higher as we move towards European hours.

- Familiar matters of focus evident in the oil market with an eye on the global

production hubs. 

- Wednesday saw Energy Intelligence sources note that Saudi Aramco has started

to scale back its production from around 12mn bpd in preparation to lower its

output to 8.5mn bpd in May.

- On the U.S. front, the latest weekly inventory data from the DoE revealed

larger than expected builds in distillate and headline crude stocks, although

gasoline provided a shallower than expected build and Cushing saw a shallower

build in w/w terms. Refinery runs continued to fall, as producers react to

market developments (U.S. crude production has fallen by ~900Kbpd in a month).

- Also worth noting that President Trump continues to beat the drum about all

things Iran, after yesterday's tweet.

- Finally the CFTC is looking into trading surrounding March's OPEC+ meeting,

while several brokerages have started to limit client exposure/access to oil

markets.