Brent crude futures for January dropped 77 cents, or 0.9%, to $86.85 per barrel by 12:54 p.m. EST (1754 GMT). U.S. WTI crude futures for December stood under 58 cents, or 0.7%, at $79.50 forward of the contract’s expiry later Monday.
Both benchmarks fell by more than $5 a barrel early behind the Wall Street Journal reported an expansion of up to 500,000 barrels a day could be viewed at the OPEC+ meeting on Dec. 4.
Oil regained most losses behind Saudi Arabian energy minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman expressed the kingdom is not concerning a potential oil production growth with other OPEC oil outputs, state news agency SPA reported, rejecting the Journal report.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and its partners, or OPEC+, recently trimmed production targets. Moreover, their leader, Saudi Arabia’s energy minister, was cited this month as saying the group will stay attentive.
Further Expectations
Discharging additional oil amid low Chinese fuel demand and U.S. dollar stability would have pushed the market deeper into contango, stimulating extra oil to go into storage and pushing prices still more down, spoke Bob Yawger, director of energy futures at Mizuho in New York.
Anticipations of additional gains in interest rates have buoyed the dollar, making dollar-denominated commodities like crude more pricey for investors.
The dollar climbed 0.9% versus the Japanese yen to 141.665 yen, on track for its largest one-day gain after Oct. 14.
New coronavirus case numbers in China stayed close to April peaks as the country battles outbreaks nationwide.
The front-month Brent crude futures spread narrowed snappily last week. Meanwhile, WTI flipped into contango, reminiscing about decreasing supply problems.
