Markets were up significantly on Friday, with markets gaining nearly $2/bbl thanks to strong stock market growth. Today, those gains are fading, with markets failing to find bullish news to continue supporting prices. Crude prices this morning are down 53 cents, trading at $61.51.
Fuel prices are also falling today, after both products rose by 2-3 cents on Friday. Today, diesel prices are down 2 cents, trading at $1.8670. Gasoline prices have seen smaller losses, but are still down 1.2 cents at $1.8928.
In conjunction with rising equity prices, oil prices soared on Friday as markets grew less afraid of Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminum. The Trump administration announced that the tariffs would not be applied to Canada and Mexico, and other countries such as Australia could receive exceptions as well.
Another supportive factor Friday was declining US rig counts. The loss of rigs was the first decline since January, and shows a slight slowing of production in the U.S. Still, the decline does not necessarily mean a long-term trend of declining production. More declines will be needed to determine whether this is a new trend or merely an anomaly.
