Oil Summary at European Close: Crude Falls

Front month crude has eased back after spiking yesterday following another Houthi rebel attack on a container ship in the Red Sea. Despite concerns, some shipping firms have restarted operations in the region.

• Brent FEB 24 down -0.9% at 80.37$/bbl
• WTI FEB 24 down -1% at 74.84$/bbl
• On Tuesday Houthi revels attacked the MSC United VIII container ship that was headed for Pakistan. Despite that, major shipping firms such as Maersk and CMA CGM were resuming passage through the Red Sea. Hapag-Lloyd will decide today whether to resume Red Sea shipping.
• Iranian oil Minister Javed Owji said Dec. 27 that he thanked Iraqi officials for cutting oil output and said both nations share a common position vis a vis OPEC+, according to Reuters.
• Kazakhstan’s daily crude output fell by 3.6% to 254k tons as the CPC oil terminal at Russia’s Black Sea halted loading due to weather conditions. Daily output at Tengiz fell by 5.4% to 78.6k tons according to Interfax.
• Russia has shipped 50% of its oil and petroleum exports to China, while shipments to India have risen to a share of 40% this year, Russian Deputy PM Alexander Novak said, cited by Bloomberg.
• China has released the first batch of 2024 crude oil import quotas to 11 non state-owned refineries in mid-December with a total volume of 3.68mn tons according to OilChem.
• Nigeria’s Bonny Light crude oil loadings are scheduled to rise to four cargoes totaling 3.9mn barrels, or 134kbpd, in February, down from 158kbpd scheduled for January, while Forcados loadings are expected to rise according to a loading program.