Oil markets in limbo before the meeting of OPEC

US West Texas Intermediate and International Reference Brent crude futures are able to settle the week higher after peaking at new highs for the previous year. However, Friday's price action suggests that investors are still waiting for a bullish catalyst to trigger a further upward push and finally break out of its trading range decisively.

Supply issues

OPEC production cuts that began on January 1 and US sanctions on Iran and Venezuela have pushed crude prices up for months, but gains have been limited by concerns over rising oil prices. US stocks and production. However, these worries were lifted Wednesday, at least temporarily, with the publication of a bullish report on EIA inventories.

The weekly EIA report released Wednesday for the week ending March 8th showed that stocks of commercial crude oil in the United States have declined as refinery production has increased.

Crude oil inventories fell by 3.9 million barrels in the last week to 449.07 million barrels, while analysts forecast an increase of 2.7 million barrels. Crude oil production in the United States also declined, dropping from 100,000 barrels per day to 12 million bpd.

In addition, oil production and exports in Venezuela continued to be disrupted by a political and economic crisis that caused massive power outages and supply shortages. According to reports, two storage tanks exploded during a crude oil upgrading project …