Week In Review – June 18, 2021

This week a storm brewing in the Gulf of Mexico began making headlines, as it could be the first storm of the new hurricane season to impact the mainland US. Forecasters are reporting that the storm system could strengthen to a tropical storm briefly before making landfall as early as the end of this week, but they are still uncertain as to an exact date. On Friday, the National Hurricane Center released a Five-Day Graphical Tropical Weather Outlook for those to monitor the situation.

Oil prices this week hit a new multi-year high on Wednesday, with crude reaching $72.29, while fuel prices sustained high levels. These price increases come amid rising concerns that oil could break the $100 threshold by the end of the 2021 calendar year. With rising demand and concerns surrounding the idea of inflation, prices are sure to be extremely volatile throughout the remainder of the year.

News of the lack of progress on Iranian nuclear negotiations pushed markets to fresh highs on Tuesday. Iran’s presidential election, which had been seen as a soft deadline for negotiations, is approaching today. The front-runner is Ebrahim Raisi, a hard-line conservative with a history of cracking down on political opposition. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who holds most of the political sway in Iran, supports negotiations, so progress is expected regardless of the presidential outcome. Still, missing this first unspoken deadline shows that a resolution will be tricky to reach.

This Week in Energy Prices

Today crude opened at $71.10, a change of $1.00 from Monday’s opening price of $70.10. Crude remained mostly unchanged throughout the entire week hovering around the $71-$72 mark, with the only exception being Wednesday’s opening price of $72.45.

Today diesel opening at $2.0679, a change of $0.0743 from Monday’s opening price of $2.1417. Wednesday’s opening price of $2.1146 represented the highest opening of the week; however, prices remained mostly unchanged.

Today gasoline opened at a price of $2.1337, a change of $0.049 from Monday’s opening price of $2.1827. Monday through Wednesday prices remained mostly unchanged around the $2.18 mark, with the drop from Wednesday to Thursday being the most drastic of the week.