TOKYO (JAPAN) – Oil prices rose again on Thursday to touch 13-month highs as worries over a cold snap in Texas disrupting US crude output for days or even weeks led to fresh buying.
Brent crude was up 56 cents, or 0.9%, at $64.90 a barrel at 0744 GMT, after witnessing a rise to $65.62 earlier in the session, its highest since January 20, 2020.
US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures saw a gain of 46 cents, or 0.8%, to $61.60 a barrel, after earlier rising to $62.26, the highest since January 8, 2020.
The freeze in Texas, the largest energy-producing state in the United States, entered a sixth day on Thursday, as it was reeling under massive refining outages and oil and gas shut-ins, which went beyond its borders into neighbouring Mexico.
According to Wood Mackenzie analysts, roughly 1 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude production has been closed down, and it could take weeks before it completely recovers.
Hiroyuki Kikukawa, general manager of research at Nissan Securities, said, “Oil prices got a boost again from expectations that the disruptions of Texas oil producers and refiners due to the cold storm could last for a while.”
“With hopes of fresh US economic stimulus and wider rollouts of the COVID-19 vaccine, oil prices are expected to stay on the bullish trend,” he said, by estimating that WTI could test a key $65 level.
Chiyoki Chen, chief analyst at Sunward Trading, said that in addition, a larger-than-anticipated draw in the US crude oil inventories aggravated concerns over supply concerns.
US crude oil stocks came down by 5.8 million barrels in the week to February 12 to about 468 million barrels, when compared with analysts’ estimates for a draw of 2.4 million barrels, showed American Petroleum Institute data.
US Energy Information Administration (EIA) oil inventory data will be released later on Thursday, which was pushed behind by a day after a holiday on Monday.
