LONDON: Oil prices were steady on Thursday, with the market focused on Ukraine’s attacks on Russian oil assets, while stalled peace talks tempered expectations of a deal restoring Russian oil flows.
Brent crude rose 35 cents, or 0.6%, to $63.02 at 1326 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate rose 41 cents, or 0.7%, to $59.36.
Ukraine hit the Druzhba oil pipeline in Russia’s central Tambov region, a Ukrainian military intelligence source said on Wednesday, the fifth attack on the pipeline that sends Russian oil to Hungary and Slovakia. The pipeline operator and Hungary’s oil and gas company later said supplies were moving through the pipeline as normal.
“Ukraine’s drone campaign against Russian refining infrastructure has shifted into a more sustained and strategically coordinated phase,” consultancy Kpler said in a research report.
Oil prices fall on weak demand; markets await Ukraine peace effort
“This has pushed Russian refining throughput down to around 5 million barrels per day between September and November, a 335,000 bpd year-on-year decline, with gasoline hit hardest and gasoil output also materially weaker,” the report added.
The perception that progress on a peace plan for Ukraine was stalling also supported prices, after U.S. President Donald Trump’s representatives emerged from peace talks with the Kremlin with no specific breakthroughs on ending the war.
“War and politics, balanced against comfortable stocks, expected supply surplus, and OPEC’s market-share strategy, keep Brent in the $60–$70 range for now,” said PVM analysts.
Previously, expectations of an end to the war had pressured prices lower, as traders anticipated a deal would allow Russian oil back into an already oversupplied global market.
Meanwhile, U.S. crude and fuel inventories rose last week as refining activity picked up, the Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday.
Crude inventories rose by 574,000 barrels to 427.5 million barrels in the week ended November 28, the EIA said, compared with analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll for an 821,000-barrel draw.
Fitch Ratings on Thursday cut its 2025-2027 oil price assumptions to reflect market oversupply and production growth that is expected to outstrip demand.
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