Crude Oil Prices – Weekly Recap 21-25 November

Despite the sharp turns in many commodities’ prices during the week, crude oil prices didn’t fluctuate as much. The growing concerns in Europe vis-à-vis the debt crisis continue to be one of the main factors to move major financial markets including the crude oil market. The news from the U.S. of the slight decline in the GDP’s estimated growth rate from 2.5% to 2.0% in the third Q 2011, and the decline in the demand for durable goods may have adversely affected the crude oil prices as well. Thus the weekly average price of crude oil sharply decline compared with previous week’s average.     

By the end of the week, WTI oil price only slightly rose by 0.04% and Brent price by 0.75%; as a result, the difference between Brent oil and WTI oil slightly slipped to $10.00/b on Friday. 

Here is a review of the price changes during last week (November 21st to November 25th) of crude oil (Brent oil and WTI), and a summary of the recent EIA crude oil and petroleum stockpiles report:

Crude Oil Prices – Highlights

 

table crude oil prices - 21-25 November 2011

WTI oil price (spot) slightly inclined during last week by 0.04%; its weekly average price on the other hand sharply fell by 2.55% as it reached $96.78 per barrel, compared with last week’s $99.32 per barrel. The average daily percent change of crude oil price (WTI) was -0.22%.

NYMEX Futures Price (December delivery) on the other hand shed 0.15% off its value during the week, and reached $96.97/b on Friday, November 25th  

Europe Brent oil price also moderately inclined during the week by 0.75% and the average price fell by 3.39% compared with previous week’s average.

The difference of Brent over WTI spot prices continued to slip during the week; its average premium was $10.16; it finished the week at $10.00.

Crude Oil Charts

The following charts show last week’s (for the week ending on November 25th) changes of WTI spot oil price, NYMEX Futures Prices (December delivery) and Europe Brent spot oil price:

The first chart presents the development of WTI and Brent oil prices during the week: as seen in the chart below, both energy prices didn’t have a clear trend.

 

Crude oil prices WTI BRENT oil chart -21-25 November 2011

The final 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 prices chart WTI Brent oil - percent change 21-25 November 2011

Crude oil prices zigzagged from gains to losses during the week with moderate percent daily changes of under two percent (in absolute terms).

Crude Oil Stockpiles –Highlights:

According to the last EIA report on the U.S Petroleum market, for the week ending on November 18th, U.S. Petroleum and crude oil stockpiles fell again by 3.8 million barrels and reached 1,732.75 million barrels. The current oil stockpiles are 99,943 million barrels below oil stockpiles levels recorded during the same week in 2010.

For the complete crude oil stockpiles review see here.

For further reading:

Previous issues of weekly report: