New York – (dpa) – Oil futures prices rose to more than $100 a barrel as Russia raised doubts about the progress of peace talks with Ukraine, and investors assessed the effects of a possible exit of Russian supplies from the global market.
In New York, oil futures rose about 7%, while a Kremlin spokesman in Moscow said that news of a significant progress in talks on Ukraine was a “mistake”, but that the talks would continue. The Russian war against Ukraine has led to a severe disruption in the flow of Russian oil supplies to world markets, while the International Energy Agency expects that the production of Russia, a key member of the OPEC Plus grouping of oil-producing countries, will decline by about a quarter during next April.
Brent crude, the benchmark, was traded today at about $105 a barrel, as its price fluctuated in the range of more than $5 during the day, for the sixteenth consecutive session.
The price of West Texas Intermediate crude, the benchmark for US oil, rose today by 6.69 dollars to 101.73 dollars a barrel for delivery next April in New York trading. The price of Brent crude rose by 7.18 dollars to 105.20 dollars a barrel for delivery next May.
For his part, commodity market broker Pierre Andorand considered that oil prices are on a path towards reaching $200 a barrel by the end of this year, in light of the difficulty of increasing global production and compensating for the absence of Russian oil from the markets.
And Bloomberg news agency quoted Andorand as saying that he believes that the global oil market has lost about 4 million barrels per day as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the sanctions that were imposed on Russia due to the invasion.
He added that while the release of quantities from the strategic reserves of oil consuming countries calmed the market in the short term, it is likely that the energy sector will not be able to increase its production capacities to compensate for the quantities that were left out of the market because of Russia.
Andurand, founder of investment management firm Andorand Capital Management, said in his latest online podcast that Russian oil would likely exit the market even if Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed to a ceasefire in Ukraine.
