US oil settles up 75 cents, or 1.4%, at $53.53
Published Tue, Feb 17 20152:39 PM EST Updated Tue, Feb 17 20153:43 PM EST
Reuters with CNBC
Oil futures rallied sharply on Tuesday afternoon, with Brent crude hitting a 2015 high of $63 a barrel as short-covering returned to the market, which was depressed earlier by worries about euro zone stability.
Brent crude's front-month contract for April delivery was up $1.10 at $62.50 a barrel, rebounding from a session low of $60.27. The session peak was $63, the highest for this year.
U.S. crude futures for March closed up 75 cents, or 1.4 percent, at $53.53 a barrel, versus the intraday low of $50.81. Options expiry in March futures was slated for Tuesday, ahead of Friday's contract expiry.
Brent crude bounced back into positive territory on Tuesday, after being dragged lower by weakness in some other commodity markets. Threats to Middle East crude supplies and expectations lower prices may prompt a slowdown in U.S. output limited the fall.
fell by up to 5 percent and snapped a three-day rally. Investors in those commodities remained cautious after a breakdown of debt talks between Greece and euro zone finance ministers.
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"I think it all started in silver with squeezing out of long positions, then spilled over to gold and then to oil," said Carsten Fritsch, commodities analyst at Commerzbank.
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Lending support to oil earlier, Egypt on Monday bombed Islamic State targets in Libya, where violence has reined in most oil output. Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government threatened to withhold oil exports if Baghdad failed to send its share of the budget.
Oil prices collapsed in the second half of 2014 on oversupply. The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries refused to cut its output, choosing to defend market share against U.S. shale oil and other competing sources.
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Brent has still jumped by about 35 percent in the last four weeks, supported by a sharp fall in U.S. oil drilling. It had reached $45.19 on Jan. 13, the lowest in almost six years, down from $115 in June.
The threat to Iraq's northern exports from the revenue dispute arises as bad weather has cut Iraq's southern shipments this month.
With risks to Middle East supply back on the market's radar, International Energy Agency Chief Economist Fatih Birol warned the rise of Islamic State presented a major challenge for the investment necessary to prevent an oil shortage in the next decade.
Even so, some analysts see the rally as overblown because the market remains oversupplied. Crude inventories in top consumer the United States have hit record highs for the last five weeks.
"U.S. refinery outages, through seasonal maintenance and industrial action, will weaken U.S. crude demand, exacerbating the crude stock excess in the near term," BNP Paribas analysts Gareth Lewis-Davies and Harry Tchilinguirian said in a report.
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