Crude oil prices rose on Wednesday above $110 a barrel, where rising optimism in financial markets after U.S. companies posted strong earnings encouraged investors to buy high yielding assets, which weighed down on the U.S. dollar, and accordingly, commodities including oil rose on the back of a weak dollar.
Moreover, the EIA reported for crude oil inventories in the United States for the week ending April 15, showed that crude oil inventories declined unexpectedly by 2.3 million barrels, compared to the prior rise in stockpiles of 1.6 million barrels, and opposite to expectations of a 1.3 million barrels increase.
Markets have become more focused on the bleak outlook for demand on oil, and that has been pushing oil prices lower, nevertheless, if this wave of optimism continues, we should expect oil prices to rise, although any increase in oil prices will remain limited.
Thursday 12:30, Canada will release the retail sales index for the month of February, where retail sales declined in January by 0.3% and expectations suggest that retail sales increased in February by 0.5%, while retail sales excluding autos probably increased by 0.5% in February after coming in flat in January.
Thursday 12:30, the U.S. Labor Department will release the weekly jobless claims for the week ending April 16, where conditions in the labor market seem to have improved recently, and jobless claims are expected to reflect that improvement, where jobless claims are expected to drop to 390K from 412K reported last week.
Thursday 14:00, the U.S. will release the leading indicators index for the month of March, where the leading indicators are considered as a gauge for future economic activities in the next three to six months, the leading indicators are expected to rise by 0.3% in March after rising by 0.8% in February.
Thursday 14:00, the U.S. will release the Philadelphia Fed index for the month of April, where the Philadelphia Fed is expected to ease to 36.8 from 43.4 reported back in March, where the manufacturing sector continues to expand and seems to be on course to recover from its worst slump since the early 1980s.
Originally posted here
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