New York West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures closed lower on Wednesday (April 5), weighed down by recession concerns. This overshadowed the positive factor of a larger-than-expected fall in US crude stocks. and from the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its allies or OPEC Plus Announcement to cut oil production
The WTI crude oil contract will be introduced in May. It was down 10 cents, or 0.1%, at $80.61 a barrel.
The Brent crude oil contract (BRENT) will be introduced in June. They were up 5 cents, or 0.1%, at $84.99 a barrel.
The US released consistently weak economic data. This caused investors to worry that the economic slowdown would affect the demand for oil. Recently, Automatic Data Processing Inc. reported. (ADP) that private sector employment in the United States rose by only 145,000 in March. This was below analysts’ expectations of 210,000 jobs after a surge of 261,000 jobs in February.
The report came just one day after the US Department of Labor revealed that job opening numbers, a measure of labor market demand, fell by 632,000 jobs to 9.9 million in February. which was the lowest level since May 2021 and below 10 million jobs for the first time since 2021, and below analysts’ expectations of 10.4 million jobs.
Recession concerns have overshadowed positive news from OPEC Plus announcing a 1.16 million bpd cut in oil production through the end of 2023 and a report from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) that said crude stockpiles had risen. a week. That was just 2.3 million barrels less than analysts had expected, and gasoline inventories were down 4.1 million barrels, far more than the 1.7 million barrel drop expected by analysts.
Investors will be keeping an eye on the release of US nonfarm payrolls numbers for March on Friday. Although analysts expected Employment numbers rose by only 238,000 in March. after jumping 311,000 jobs in February And the unemployment rate is expected to remain steady at 3.6% in March.
