Investors are looking for signs of where prices will go next, waiting for US oil stocks data to be released later in the day and try to make a profit. Oil fell on Wednesday in the third session.
Brent crude for May dropped 56 cents, or 0.8%, to $66.96 a barrel by 0414 GMT, while West Texas Intermediate crude for April was at $63.56 a barrel, down 45 cents, or 0.7%.
Prices were supported last week by OPEC + ‘s decision to largely continue production cuts in April. Later Monday, after the Yemeni Houthi attacks the Saudis oil industry, Brent rose to over $ 70 a barrel.
The attack is said to have no effect on supply.
A number of factors caused prices to drop, including the pull of crude oil from the largest importers China and India at the current high prices and the prospects for a return in Iranian oil supply.
Crude oil stocks in the United States increased by 12.8 million barrels in the week to March 5, according to data from the American Petroleum Institute industry group. Whereas analysts had expected an increase of about 800,000 barrels.
Official figures from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) are expected to be at 15:30 GMT on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, higher prices are expected to bring more U.S. crude oil back online.
U.S. crude production is still expected to fall by 160,000 barrels per day (bpd) in 2021 to 11.15 million bpd, the EIA said on Tuesday, but that’s a smaller decline than its previous monthly forecast for a 290,000-bpd drop.
The OPEC + group could be the victim of its own success, as high prices due to supply constraints could spur US oil production. Prices are well above the level needed to stimulate a significant increase in US production. The longer it stays above this threshold, the greater the incentive to increase production for the US and other non-OPEC + producers.
