World oil prices towards the largest decline in two years

The lack of major disruptions in supply as a result of the conflict between Iran and Israel has led to geopolitical threats almost complete extinction.

Brent oil rose by 54 cents, or 0.8%, reaching 68.26 dollars per barrel, while American oil West Texas Intermediate (WTI) grew by 60 cents, or approximately 0.9%, to $66.83 per barrel.

During the 12-day conflict that began on 13 June, after Israel hit Iranian nuclear facilities, Brent's prices went up temporarily over 80 dollars per barrel, but then fell to 67 dollars after US President Donald Trump announced a ceasefire between the two countries. As a result, both contracts are on the way to register a weekly drop of about 12%.

“Tregu has almost completely ignored the geopolitical danger of a week ago and is returning to a market run by economic foundations”, Rystad Energy analyst Janiv Shah said.

Attention is also focused on the upcoming OPEC+ meeting, which will be held on 6 July and is expected to determine production levels for the month of August.

According to analysts, there may be space for another month with a hasty decrease in production restrictions, but all will depend on demand indicators over the summer.

Administration for Energy Information in the US (EIA), released Wednesday, showed that crude oil and fuel reserves have declined in the past week, while refining activity and demand have increased.

Also, Thursday's data showed that gassoil oil reserves at the Amsterdam-Roterdam-Anvers (ARA) refining and storage centre have fallen to the lowest level in more than a year.

At the same time, Chinese imports of Iranian oil suffered significant increases in June, as a result of speeding up remittances ahead of the escalation of the conflict and increasing demand by independent refinerys.

China is the world's largest importer of oil and the leading buyer of Iranian oil./Periscopi/