Oil prices rise more than 2%

Oil prices rose more than 2% on Wednesday, recovering some of the previous session’s losses, as a drop in US crude inventories and concerns about disruptions to US production outweighed concerns about weak global demand.

US crude inventories fell by 2.793 million barrels, fuel stocks fell by 513,000 barrels and distillate stocks rose by 191,000 barrels, according to Sky News.

Brent crude futures rose $1.41, or 2.04%, to $70.60 a barrel by 10:48 GMT.

US West Texas Intermediate crude futures rose $1.79, or 2.7%, to $67.54 a barrel.

“The market rebounded automatically as Tuesday’s decline was big,” said Yuki Takashima, an economist at Nomura Securities, adding that supply disruption concerns due to Hurricane Francine also provided support.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said on Tuesday that about 24% of crude oil production and 26% of natural gas production in the Gulf of Mexico were shut due to the storm.

OPEC said in a monthly report on Tuesday that global oil demand will rise by 2.03 million barrels per day in 2024, down from last month’s growth forecast of 2.11 million barrels per day.

OPEC also cut its estimate for global oil demand growth in 2025 to 1.74 million barrels per day from 1.78 million barrels per day.