MOSCOW (MRC) -- Oil prices rises as investors looked for bargains following the previous day's plunge, but gains were capped as pandemic lockdowns in Europe and a build in US crude stocks curbed risk appetite and raised oversupply fears, reported Hydrocarbonprocessing.
Brent crude futures rose 27 cents, or 0.4%, to USD61.06 a barrel by 0108 GMT, after tumbling 5.9% and hitting a low of USD60.50 the previous day.
West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures climbed 19 cents, or 0.3%, to USD57.95 a barrel, having lost 6.2% and touched a low of USD57.32 on Tuesday.
Both benchmarks touched their lowest levels since early February on Tuesday and have now fallen more than 14% from their recent highs earlier this month.
The front-month spread for both Brent and WTI slipped into contango, where front-month contracts are lower than the later months, a sign that demand for prompt crude is declining.
Germany, Europe's biggest oil consumer, extended its lockdown to April 18, and Chancellor Angela Merkel urged citizens to stay at home for five days over the Easter holiday.
Worries over the pace of the recovery from the pandemic were also heightened after a US health agency said the AstraZeneca Plc vaccine developed with Oxford University may have included outdated information in its data.
Adding to pressure, US crude oil stocks jumped by 2.9 million barrels in the week to March 19, against analysts' expectations in a Reuters' poll for a decline of about 300,000 barrels, according to trading sources citing data from industry group the American Petroleum Institute.
As MRC informed previously, oil producers face an unprecedented challenge to balance supply and demand as factors including the pace and response to COVID-19 vaccines cloud the outlook, according to an official with International Energy Agency's (IEA) statement.
We remind that the COVID-19 outbreak has led to an unprecedented decline in demand affecting all sections of the Russian economy, which has impacted the demand for petrochemicals in the short-term. However, the pandemic triggered an increase in the demand for polymers in food packaging, and cleaning and hygiene products, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company. With Russian petrochemical companies having the advantage of access to low-cost feedstock, and proximity to demand-rich Asian (primarily China) and European markets for the supply of petrochemical products, these companies appear to be well-positioned to derive full benefits from an improving market environment and global economy post-COVID-19, says GlobalData.
We also remind that in December 2020, Sibur, Gazprom Neft, and Uzbekneftegaz agreed to cooperate on potential investments in Uzbekistan including a major expansion of Uzbekneftegaz’s existing Shurtan Gas Chemical Complex (SGCC) and the proposed construction of a new gas chemicals facility. The signed cooperation agreement for the projects includes “the creation of a gas chemical complex using methanol-to-olefins (MTO) technology, and the expansion of the production capacity of the Shurtan Gas Chemical Complex”.
Ethylene and propylene are feedstocks for producing polyethylene (PE) and polypropylene (PP).
According to MRC's ScanPlast report, Russia's estimated PE consumption totalled 241,030 tonnes in January 2021 versus 217,890 tonnes a year earlier. Only shipments of low density polyethylene (LDPE) and high density polyethylene (HDPE) increased. At the same time, PP shipments to the Russian market reached 141,870 tonnes in January 2021 versus 123,520 tonnes a year earlier. Supply of homopolymer PP and PP block copolymers increased.
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