Oil settles slightly higher but remains near 12-year lows

By FXStreet FXStreet (Córdoba) – Oil prices started the day on a positive note and moving away from $30.00, but the rally was interrupted after the US inventories report showed buildup in crude, gasoline and distillates stockpiles, which sent the commodity back towards multi-year lows.

West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures surged to $31.69 a barrel before erasing most of its intraday gains and falling back to the $30.00 region, after the EIA report showed that inventories rose by 234K barrels last week, less than expected, but also showing a massive 8.4 million barrels’ increase in gasoline inventories and over 6 more million in distillates such as diesel and heating oil.

WTI for February settled at $30.48 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, up 4 cents, or 0.1%.

Oil technical perspective

“The commodity maintains the negative tone seen on previous updates, and the daily chart suggests that further declines are likely, as the technical indicators continue heading south, despite being in extreme oversold levels, although the commodity accumulates an eight day straight decline, which means the risk of an upward corrective movement is quite high”, said Valeria Bednarik, chief analyst at FXStreet. “Shorter term, and according to the 4 hours chart, …read more

Source:: FX Street