OIL PRICES EXTEND GAINS AS FREEZING TEXAS CUTS U.S. OUTPUT

Oil prices rose as much as a dollar on Thursday, February 18, 2021, extending this week’s gains and hitting 13-month highs, as a cold snap sweeping Texas and surrounding regions shut at least a fifth of US refining output and a million barrels of crude production, Yuka Kobayashi reported for Reuters.

Both benchmarks rose about $1 on Wednesday and have gained more than 6% since their close last Thursday. The unusual freeze hitting much of the United States could hamper crude output for days or even weeks, analysts said.

The Texas energy sector remained without power for a fifth day on Wednesday, after an arctic blast stretched deep into southern states not typically hit by extreme cold.

Roughly 1 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude production have been shut, according to Wood Mackenzie analysts, and it could be weeks before production is fully restored.

“A flurry of fresh buying in oil futures was triggered as an unexpected impact on oil production and refiners in Texas from a cold storm raised supply fears of crude and fuel,” said Chiyoki Chen, chief analyst at Sunward Trading. “A larger-than-anticipated draw in the U.S. crude oil inventories also added to supply concerns,” Chen said.

US crude oil stocks fell by 5.8 million barrels in the week to Feb. 12 to about 468 million barrels, compared with analysts’ expectations for a draw of 2.4 million barrels, American Petroleum Institute data showed.

US Energy Information Administration (EIA) oil inventory data will be released later on Thursday, delayed by a day after a Monday holiday.

Oil prices have rallied over recent weeks on hopes for US stimulus and as global supplies tighten, due largely to production cuts from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and allied producers in the group OPEC+.

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