Crude Holds Onto Gains, Approaching Overbought

Oil prices have range traded today holding onto the week’s gains. There has been little new news and the US is closed for a holiday. WTI is slightly higher at $80.74/bbl after moving in a range of $80.67 - $80.88. Brent is also little changed at $85.35/bbl after a high of $85.47 and low of $85.28. The benchmark broke key resistance at $84.72 and if sustained undermines the recent bearish theme. The USD index is also unchanged.

• Oil prices have been supported this week by positive risk appetite and equities are generally rallying again across APAC today and so the market has looked through data showing a US crude stock build.
• Benchmarks are approaching levels that would result in a shift from a bearish theme to bullish, but Bloomberg is reporting that Brent’s 9-day relative strength index is above 70 and getting close to signalling that it is overbought.
• Asian demand has been an area of concern for oil markets and the fall in China’s refining output in May added to this. One reason for that weakness has been seasonal maintenance but the strength of demand when that is finished remains unclear.
• Bloomberg reported that US crude inventories rose 2.26mn barrels last week, according to people familiar with the API data. But gasoline stocks fell 1.08mn while distillate rose 538k. Prices have looked through the data. The official EIA data is delayed one day due to today’s US holiday and will be released on Thursday.
• The US is closed today. UK May PPI/CPI and euro area Q1 current account print.