Oil futures pulled back on Thursday from the mulitmonth highs they saw a day earlier, with the U.S. benchmark settling below the key $60 mark as global crude prices suffered their first loss in four sessions.
Prices for both benchmark had climbed by more than 1% Wednesday after U.S. government data showed an unexpectedly large fall in domestic crude inventories.
On its first full session as a front-month contract, West Texas Intermediate crude for May delivery CLK9, -0.22% on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 25 cents, or 0.4%, to settle at $59.98 a barrel after tapping a high of $60.39. May Brent crude LCOK9, -1.11% lost 64 cents, or 0.9%, to $67.86 a barrel on ICE Futures Group.
U.S. benchmark WTI remains up by nearly 2% for the week and losses for crude Thursday were modest. Oil may have seen some support from risk-on sentiment, with U.S. equities headed broadly higher as investors digested the conclusion of a Federal Reserve meeting a day earlier that saw policy makers signal they would deliver no rate increases in 2019. The central bank, however, cited concerns over global growth prospects, which could threaten energy demand.
The Energy Information Administration on Wednesday said U.S. crude inventories fell by an unexpected 9.6 million barrels last week, while supplies of gasoline dropped 4.6 million barrels and distillates declined by 4.1 million barrels.
On Nymex, April gasoline RBJ9, +0.51% rose 0.2% to $1.920 a gallon, while April heating oil HOJ9, -0.12% was off 1.1% to settle at $1.987 a gallon.
“Stocks normally increase at this time of the year, which makes the substantial inventory reduction all the more remarkable,” wrote analysts at Commerzbank.
“U.S. crude oil stocks meanwhile are slightly below the five-year average. The sizable inventory overhang that had still been in place until recently was thus eradicated completely. The U.S. oil market is no longer oversupplied, in other words, which should benefit WTI and result in further price convergence” with Brent futures, they said.
In other energy trade, April natural gas NGJ19, -0.14% settled little changed at $2.821 per million British thermal units.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported Thursday that domestic supplies of natural gas fell by 47 billion cubic feet for the week ended March 15. The data, however, included a slight upward revision to the previous week’s total stocks. Analysts polled by S&P Global Platts had expected a decline of 48 billion cubic feet.