Global oil prices slightly decreased, Report informs referring to the auction data.
Negative economic statistics reinforced fears for demand, despite the data on the decline in crude stocks in the United States.
The price of June futures for Brent crude fell by 0.54% to $84.53 per barrel, May futures for WTI fell by 0.67% to $80.07.
Traders paid attention to the statistics from the US. Thus, the index of business activity in the US service sector in March fell to 51.2% from February’s figure of 55.1%, being below the expected 54.5%.
At the same time, the markets are evaluating the weekly data on commercial oil reserves in the US. The indicator for the week to March 31 fell more than expected - by 3.7 million barrels. Only a 2.3 million decline was expected. Distillate and gasoline inventories also declined more than expected. Oil production remained at the previous week’s level of 12.2 million barrels per day.
Since the beginning of the week, oil prices have shown an increase of about 5.4%. At the beginning of the week, prices jumped after the OPEC+ decision to reduce oil production.