Oil rises amid optimism about the growth in demand for fuel in China

Oil prices rose on Thursday as hopes for a strong recovery in fuel demand in China, the world’s largest oil consumer, offset losses from a stronger dollar and a large build in US crude inventories.

And by 0725 GMT, Brent crude futures rose 59 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $ 85.97 a barrel, and West Texas Intermediate crude futures rose 73 cents, or 0.9 percent, to $ 79.32 a barrel.

The International Energy Agency said that oil demand will rise by two million barrels per day in 2023, an increase of 100,000 barrels per day from last month’s forecast, to a record level of 101.9 million barrels per day, and that China will be the cause of 900,000 barrels per day of the increase.

The agency stated that China will account for nearly half of the growth in oil demand in 2023 after easing the restrictions of Covid-19.

The dollar, which usually moves against crude oil prices, rose on the back of strong US retail sales data and held onto most of those gains on Thursday.

And the Energy Information Administration said that US crude stocks jumped last week by 16.3 million barrels to 471.4 million barrels, the highest level since June 2021. The increase, which was larger than expected, was mainly due to adjusting the data, which analysts said mitigated its impact on Oil prices.