Oil prices fell in Asia today following a surprise
increase in US commercial crude oil stockpiles and a slew of soft
economic data from leading energy consumers.
US
benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude for September delivery eased 28
cents to $97.31, while Brent crude for September delivery shed 50 cents
to $103.78 in mid-morning trade.
A build in US inventories for the first time in seven weeks weighed on prices, analysts said.
US
crude oil inventories rose 1.4 million barrels to 367.0 million in the
week ending August 8, the Department of Energy said. Crude oil supplies
had contracted by roughly 22 million barrels over the prior six weeks.
The
increase in inventories surprised analysts, who expected a decline of
1.7 million barrels, according to a survey by Dow Jones Newswires.
Benchmark
prices also weakened due to “soft economic data from Europe and China”,
said Sanjeev Gupta, head of the Asia-Pacific oil and gas practice at
consultancy firm EY.
A string of disappointing
Chinese data released on Wednesday raised concerns about growth in the
world’s second largest economy and top energy consumer.
The
Asian giant’s bank lending plunged to 385.2 billion yuan ($62.5
billion) in July, a dramatic decline from June’s 1.08 trillion yuan as
the weakening property sector hit the demand for loans.
Also,
data for industrial output, retail sales and fixed-asset investment
were in line with expectations but slightly slower from the previous
month’s data.
In Germany, investment sentiment fell
to its lowest level in nearly two years in August amid concerns about
the economic fallout from current global crises, a survey found on
Tuesday.
The widely watched investor confidence index
calculated by the ZEW economic institute fell by 18.5 points to 8.6
points in August, its lowest level since December 2012.
Analysts had expected only a minor fall.
Germany,
Europe’s largest economy, is the world’s eighth largest energy
consumer, according to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA).
No comments:
Post a Comment