Oil hits three-month high amid tighter supplies, refinery outage
BNN Bloomberg
Oil rose to a three-month high, closing above a key technical barrier, as signs of a tighter crude market outweighed the prospect of another hike from the Federal Reserve.
West Texas Intermediate settled above US$78 a barrel as OPEC+ cuts begin to materialize, tightening global supplies. Adding to the intraday rally was an outage at Exxon’s Baton Rouge refinery, where a gasoline-making catalytic cracker may be down for several weeks. The disruption during the high-demand summer driving season also boosted the 3-2-1 crack — a measure of the profitability of turning crude into fuel — to the highest since March.
U.S. benchmark crude closed above its 200-day moving average, which has provided strong resistance since August. Oil holding above that threshold could spur additional buying. Risk-on sentiment in equity markets, which are trading near the highest levels this year, also is bolstering crude.
