Oil Ends Week Lower on End of Supply Disruptions

Oil prices were set for a second straight week of decline on Friday after Libyan ports reopened and on the view that Iran might still export some crude despite U.S. sanctions.


West Texas Intermediate graph

Brent crude LCOc1 was down 10 cents at $74.35 per barrel by 1308 GMT, having fallen earlier by 1.3 percent. It was heading for a weekly fall of around 3 percent.

U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude CLc1 was up 10 cents at $70.43, and was on course for a weekly decline of around 4 percent.

Oil approached $80 in late June and early July due to Libyan and Venezuelan supply disruptions and fears the United States would press all buyers of Iranian oil to cut imports to zero from November.

But prices weakened in recent days as OPEC member Libya reopened its ports in the east and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Washington would consider granting waivers to some of Iran’s crude buyers.

via Reuters

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Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza