Crude Oil Prices – Weekly Recap 5-9 March 2012

Crude oil prices didn’t do much during last week as they have edged up on weekly scale by nearly 1%.   There are still concerns regarding the future ramifications regarding Iran but since there wasn’t any development on this front, oil prices continued to trade high. The positive news of the 227 thousand increases in non-farm payroll employment helped trade up crude oil.  During last week, WTI oil price rose by 0.66% and Brent oil by 1.16%; as a result, the difference between Brent and WTI reached $18.43/b on Friday. 

Here is a short recap for the changes in crude oil prices (Brent oil and WTI) between March 5th and March 9th and a summary of the last EIA oil stockpiles update:

Crude Oil Price – Highlights

table crude oil prices - 5-9 March 2012WTI oil price (spot) edged up during last week by 0.66%; its weekly average price slipped by 1.15% to $106.31 per barrel, compared with last week’s $107.54 per barrel. The average daily percent change of crude oil price (WTI) was 0.14%.

NYMEX Futures Price (April delivery) also increased by 0.66% during the week, and reached $107.40/b on Friday, March 9th.

Europe Brent oil price also rose during the week by 1.16%, and the average price increased by 0.11% compared with previous week’s average.

The difference of Brent over WTI spot prices slightly rose during the week; its average premium was $18.20; it finished the week at $18.43.

Crude Oil Charts

In the following charts (referring to the week ending on March 9th) are the shifts in WTI spot oil, NYMEX Future (Short term delivery) and Europe Brent prices:

The first chart shows the developments of WTI and Brent oil prices during the week: Brent and WTI oil prices have had a moderate upward trend during the week.

Crude oil price WTI BRENT oil chart - 5-9 March 2012The second chart shows the daily percent changes (i.e. changes around the trend) of crude oil prices (WTI spot oil, WTI future, Brent spot oil):

 

Crude oil price chart WTI Brent oil - percent change 5-9 March 2012Crude Oil Stockpiles –Highlights:

According to the recent EIA report on the U.S Petroleum market, for the week ending on March 2nd, U.S. Petroleum stockpiles declined by 1.4 million barrels and reached 1,753.9 million barrels.

For the complete crude oil stockpiles review see here.

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