Oil falls by nearly 7% in London with US-Chinese tension

Sao Paulo – oil futures showed a sharp decline this Wednesday, 11, in a move of Risk aversion triggered by the trade conflict between China and United States and for issues concerning the global supply of commodities.

At the New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex) In August, it closed down 5.03% to 70.38 dollars a barrel, with the worst daily performance since June 2017. At the Intercontinental Exchange ( ICE), the barrel of Brent for September fell 6.92% to $ 73.40 at the worst time of the day, more than 7%.

A technical move penalized oil prices in the afternoon of Wednesday. Earlier in the day, commodity futures have already been penalized by trade disputes between the two world powers. On Tuesday night, the United States released a list of more than 6,000 Chinese products that could be subject to tariffs of 10% as of late August. China has responded and says it will take "necessary countermeasures" against Washington after stating that US stocks are "totally unacceptable."

"If the United States applies this additional tariff on $ 200 billion of imported Chinese products, that China does not impose higher duties on products imported from the United States," said Olivier Jakob , director of Petromatrix Energy. China was the second largest importer of US oil in the first quarter of the year, according to data released by the US Department of Energy (DoE). Until now, Beijing has not imposed tariffs on US oil, and the commodity has remained resilient despite the turmoil experienced in other assets, such as US stocks and bonds. .

The negative sentiment of oil became even stronger when the national oil company of Libya (NOC) announced the suspension of the force majeure in the ports of Ras Lanouf, Es Sider, Hariga and Zuetina after the installations were delivered to the company in the morning. According to the NOC, oil production and exports will return to normal levels within hours.

Rystad Energy Vice President of Petroleum Market, Bjornar Tonhaugen, said the measure was "a major contributor" to falling prices on Wednesday. He estimated that about 700,000 barrels of oil a day would be returned to the global market. "The situation in Libya is very precarious right now and difficult on the geopolitical front," said the analyst, adding that the risk of further disruptions remains.

Also on Wednesday, the DoE reported that oil stocks fell by 12.633 million barrels last week, while analysts predicted a drop of 3.6 million barrels. However, the weekly report did not catch the market's attention, but another ministerial document was followed by investors. In this document, DoE maintains the forecast of the average price of Brent oil, traded to ICE, in the second half of this year at 73 US dollars. For the following year, the projection is $ 69 per barrel, the same as the most recent report published in June