March 14, 2018

Oil prices rise on Wednesday after posting two days of declines at the start of the week.

Support came from a report that U. S. crude inventories are not rising as much as expected during the spring season now starting, implying healthy demand, and from strong China data.

Brent crude futures were at 64.74 dollars per barrel, up 10 cents.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at 60.84 dollars a barrel at 0225 GMT, up 13 cents.

U.S. crude inventories rose by 1.2 million barrels in the week to March 9, to 428 million barrels, the American Petroleum Institute said on Tuesday.

Support also came from China, where January-February domestic crude oil production fell 1.9 per cent on the year to 30.37 million tonnes, equivalent to 3.77 million barrels per day (bpd), according to data from the National Statistical Bureau on Wednesday.

At the same time, crude oil throughput rose 7.3 per cent to 93.4 million tonnes, implying a need for more imports.

China’s industrial output grew 7.2 per cent in the first two months of the year compared with the same period last year, beating expectations of a 6.1 per cent hike.

Weekly U.S. crude production figures will be published by the Energy Information Administration (EIA) later on Wednesday.

Estimates by the EIA show global supplies will exceed 100 million bpd for the first time in the second quarter of 2018.