By Scott DiSavino
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Oil prices climbed about 2% on Wednesday on worries the conflict in the Middle East could disrupt oil supplies and ahead of an expected U.S. Federal Reserve announcement that could provide clues about future interest rates.
Brent futures for January delivery rose $1.63, or 1.9% to $86.65 a barrel by 10:50 a.m. EDT (1450 GMT). But the January contract remained below where the December contract settled on Tuesday.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude rose $1.64, or 2.0%, to $82.66 per barrel.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said energy firms added 0.7 million barrels of crude into stockpiles during the week ended Oct. 24, which was lower than the 1.3 million barrel build analysts forecast in a Reuters poll and the 1.3 million barrel build the American Petroleum Institute (API), an industry group, reported a day earlier.
“Nothing that was really out of line with expectations,” Price Futures Group analyst Phil Flynn told Reuters. “It wasn’t really enough to move the needle here. Crude storage is not up as much as market was expecting.”
“The market will continue to be dominated by headlines out of the Middle East and fears that the conflict will spread resulting in a supply disruption that either keeps Iranian oil off the market or Iran takes steps to restrict flows through the Strait of Hormuz,” said Andrew Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates in Houston.
In Gaza, a first group of injured people were evacuated to Egypt, a source and Egyptian media said, as Israeli forces pressed their battle against Hamas militants.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called on Muslim states to cease oil and food exports to Israel, demanding an end to its bombardment of the Gaza Strip, state media reported.
Iran, a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), produced around 2.5 million barrels per day of crude in 2022, according to U.S. energy data.
Callum Macpherson, head of commodities at Investec, said that if there is no threat to output from the war, “oil may struggle to sustain prices around recent highs without support from OPEC+ into 2024, making their meeting later this month crucial.”
INTEREST RATE POLICY
The Fed ends is widely expected to hold rates steady at the end of its policy meeting.
In Europe, October inflation in the Euro zone was at its lowest in two years, a Eurostat flash reading showed, stoking the view the European Central Bank is unlikely to hike interest rates soon. The Bank of England is expected to meet on Thursday.
Interest rate hikes to fight inflation can slow economic growth and dampen oil demand.
In China, the world’s largest oil importer, factory activity unexpectedly contracted in October, a private survey showed, adding to downbeat official figures from a day earlier.
(Reporting by Scott DiSavino and Nicole Jao in New York, Shariq Khan in Bengaluru, Natalie Grover in London, Mohi Narayan in New Delhi and Emily Chow in Singapore; editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Jason Neely, Louise Heavens, Jonathan Oatis and David Gregorio)
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