US oil finishes almost flat, with Brent decline, but two benchmarks mark fourth consecutive weekly increase

Oil prices in the United States came to a close on Friday and global crude oil fell, as the market continued to question the ability of the world's major producers to offset losses in Iranian oil exports related to oil prices. US sanctions pending.

Nevertheless, the two raw benchmarks recorded a fourth consecutive weekly advance. Both had scored their highest settlements in almost four years on Wednesday.

November West Texas Intermediate Brut

CLX8, + 0.04%

the benchmark US contract yielded a penny to settle at $ 74.34 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It climbed to a four-year high of $ 76.41 on Wednesday, but recorded its largest percentage decline since a day since mid-August on Thursday. December Brent

LCOZ8, -0.52%

lost 42 cents, or 0.5%, to finish at $ 84.16 per barrel on ICE Futures Europe.

For the week, on the basis of first-month contracts, WTI rose 1.5%, while Brent crude gained 1.7%.

The 15 members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries increased their crude oil production in September to 33.07 million barrels per day, an increase of 180,000 barrels per day from August, according to a survey conducted by S & P Global Platts with analysts, representatives from industry and the transportation sector. data published on Friday.

The survey indicates that "it is the largest number of countries that OPEC has pumped since July 2017, if the Republic of Congo, which joined the organization in June, is not included."

The figures also show that OPEC and its 10 non-OPEC partners, led by Russia, "exceeded their stated goal of increasing production by one million bp. / j compared to the level of May ".

Herman Wang, editor-in-chief of Oil News at S & P Global Platts, told MarketWatch that OPEC, plus Russia, had surpassed the rise of one million barrels a day, but that "OPEC accounted for 850,000 euros [barrels a day] above its May level. OPEC agreed in June to limit the cuts in production of members that began in January 2017.

"There are clearly dark storm clouds on the market, with Iranian and Venezuelan production in a downward spiral."

"There are definitely some dark storm clouds on the market, with production going down in Iranian and Venezuelan production," Wang said. "It seems that OPEC and its allies will have to do more to avoid soaring prices than the president [Donald] Trump is worried, but there is significant doubt about OPEC's willingness and ability to pump. "

Trump's decision to withdraw from a 2015 international agreement to curb Iran's nuclear program, as well as the imposition of economic sanctions on the third-largest crude oil producer set to turn next month, played a key role in the construction of multi-year futures contracts.

The uncertainty remains as to whether major oil producers, including OPEC members and key non-OPEC members, such as Russia, have available capacity to offset the loss of Iranian exports.

"The two main uncertainties facing the oil market are, firstly, the available capacity to replace the Iranian barrels and, secondly, the unknown magnitude of these lost volumes due to the lack of clarity in the oil market. US administration, "wrote Goldman Sachs commodity analysts, including Damien Courvalin and Jeffrey Currie, in a recent research note.

Goldman estimates that the sanctions resulted in a loss of 1.5 million barrels a day in the fourth quarter, but analysts "recognize that the uncertainty surrounding the extent of the disruption will only be lifted when from 4 November when sanctions come into force ".

At the same time, monthly employment data in the United States were mixed, providing little indication of oil in terms of the health of the economy and the demand for crude oil. The US unemployment rate fell to 3.7% in September, while the economy created 134,000 new jobs – the smallest increase in 12 months.

Data from Baker Hughes

BHGE, -1.42%

Friday revealed that the number of active oil rigs in the United States, a key barometer of activity in the sector, decreased from 2 to 861 this week. This marked a third consecutive weekly decline.

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Back on Nymex, petroleum futures ended up with November's gasoline

RBX8, -0.77%

down 0.7% to $ 2.086 per gallon and November in oil

HOX8, -0.38%

lose 0.3% at $ 2.392 a gallon. Both finished higher for the week.

November natural gas

NGX18, -0.41%

lost 0.7% to $ 3.143 per million British thermal units, but experienced a weekly rise of 4.5%.