Mid-Week Review – March 31, 2021

Crude Oil Price Forecast – Crude Oil Markets Continue Noisy Behavior

The West Texas Intermediate Crude Oil market has been all over the place during the trading session on Monday as we continue to see conflicting headlines cause major issues. For example, the tanker in the Suez Canal has finally been moved, but at this point in time there are also reports that perhaps the Russians might push to extend production cuts into the month of April. In other words, this is a market that has a lot to digest. From a technical analysis standpoint, we are going sideways after a trendline break and also have a flat 50-day EMA around a large psychologically important figure. In other words, confusion reigns. Click Here to read more from FX Empire.

OPEC+ Panel Lowers Oil Demand Growth Forecast

OPEC+ has lowered its 2021 oil demand growth forecast by 300,000 barrels per day reflecting concerns about the market’s recovery amid a wave of new coronavirus lockdowns, a report from its expert’s panel meeting seen by Reuters showed. The Joint Technical Committee, which advises the group of oil-producing nations that includes Saudi Arabia and Russia, met on Tuesday ahead of a ministerial meeting on Thursday to decide output policy. Click Here to read more from Reuters.

US Government Returns All Stored Oil

The U.S. has returned 18.3 million barrels of oil temporarily stored in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve by energy companies that had rented space there when prices were crashing last year. Oil prices briefly turned negative last year in an unprecedented period of volatility after the economy shut down and demand dried up. On April 2, 2020, the Department of Energy said it would offer oil companies 30 million barrels of space. Click Here to read more from CNBC.

Carbon Taxes Win Another Endorsement – from the U.S. Oil Lobby

Carbon pricing didn’t just win a big endorsement from Canada’s Supreme Court on Thursday — it also got surprising support from a new corner in the U.S.: the American oil lobby. The country’s main oil-industry group, the American Petroleum Institute, endorsed carbon pricing as part of its 13-page list of proposals for climate action. It called carbon pricing a clearer, more transparent approach than a patchwork of different regulations. Click Here to read more from CBC.