Oil prices on Wednesday eased slightly on positive developments on the energy front. Global benchmark Brent Crude was trading at $101 per barrel, down 2.26 percent. On the other hand, WTI Crude showed deeper cuts, falling over 3.12 percent to $93 per barrel.
The relief comes after the commodity surged for almost a week with Brent closing in to $120 per barrel mark for the first time in almost four years.
Wednesday’s relief came as multiple developments indicated the energy crisis easing to a certain extent.
In the week ended 13 March, the crude stocks of United States rose while fuel inventories fell, Reuters reported. This indicated that the country was releasing fuel in the market to cool down the prices.
Crude stocks rose by 6.56 million barrels in the week ended March 13, the report said citing sources. Gasoline inventories fell by 4.56 million barrels, while distillate inventories fell by 1.39 million barrels from a week earlier.
US will be releasing 172 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to control soaring prices since Middle East supply disruptions.
This is part of a 400-million-barrel global release coordinated by the International Energy Agency (IEA) to address energy shortages, marking one of the largest ever coordinated actions.
Another relief for the global fuel supply could be the agreement between the Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Regional Government to resume oil exports to Turkey’s Ceyhan energy hub from Wednesday.
Iraq’s oil minister Hayan Abdel-Ghani had said on Tuesday that the agreement was signed to resume supplies to Turkey.
He also said that the Iraqi government was in talks with Iran to allow some Iraqi oil tankers to pass through the strategic Strait of Hormuz.
After over two weeks of getting choked due to the United States-Israel-Iran war, the strait has seen some ships passing through its after Iran lowered its guard.
According to experts, while these initiative were welcome, only complete normalisation of the situation can bring back oil prices to the earlier $67 per barrel.
