Oil Declining For The Fifth Consecutive Day After The Rise in US Inventories

Oil prices fell for the fifth consecutive day on Thursday, March 18th, after official data revealed a sustained increase in crude and fuel stocks in the United States, while the ongoing pandemic clouded the outlook for demand.

Brent crude fell 37 cents, or 0.5%, to $ 67.63 a barrel, after falling 0.6% on Wednesday. US crude fell 32 cents, or 0.5%, to $ 64.28 a barrel, after falling 0.3% in the previous session.

On Wednesday, government data showed that US crude stocks rose for the fourth consecutive week after refineries in the south were forced to close due to severe winter weather. An industry report that estimated that stocks had decreased has raised hopes that the series of increases may have stalled.

The US Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday that US crude inventories increased by 2.4 million barrels last week, a day after an estimate by the American Petroleum Institute indicated a decrease of one million barrels. Gasoline and diesel stocks increased against analysts’ expectations for a decline.

On the demand side, a slowdown in some vaccination campaigns against the Coronavirus and the possibility of further restrictions to control the pandemic have limited expectations of a recovery in fuel consumption.

A number of European countries have stopped using the AstraZeneca vaccine for Covid-19 due to concerns about possible side effects.

Germany is also seeing a spike in infections, while Italy plans to impose nationwide lockdown measures over Easter and France will implement tougher restrictions.