Forexpros – Crude oil futures held steady above the psychologically important USD100-a-barrel level on Thursday, as investors awaited developments surrounding a potential European Union embargo on Iranian oil imports.
On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in January traded at USD100.33 a barrel during European morning trade, easing down 0.03%.
The January contract traded between a range of USD100.15 a barrel, the daily low and USD100.90, the daily high.
Oil traders were awaiting the outcome of a meeting of EU foreign ministers later in the day in Brussels, at which they were expected to discuss whether to press ahead with an Iranian oil import embargo.
The ministers were also expected to add nearly 200 Iranian companies and individuals to its sanctions list and will discuss the regional response to the attack on the British embassy in Tehran earlier in the week.
Iran is the world’s fourth largest oil producer and the second biggest exporter among OPEC members.
Crude prices continued to draw support from the previous day’s coordinated action by the world’s major central banks, including the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank to lower dollar swap rates to prevent a lack of liquidity in the global financial system.
Also underlining prices, the People’s Bank of China said Wednesday that it cut banks reserve requirement ratios by 0.5%, in an effort to help boost liquidity and support the world’s second largest economy amid global market turmoil.
However, concerns over the global economic outlook remained after official data showed that Chinese manufacturing activity contracted in November for the first time in nearly three years as export orders fell sharply.
Worries about a slowdown in U.S. oil demand also kept gains in check after weekly data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration released Wednesday showed that U.S. crude inventories rose by 3.9 million barrels last week, significantly higher than expectations for a 1.5 million barrel increase.
The U.S. and China are the world’s two largest oil consuming nations.
Elsewhere, on the ICE Futures Exchange, Brent oil futures for January delivery shed 0.45% to trade at USD110.01 a barrel, with the spread between the Brent and crude contracts standing at USD9.68 a barrel.
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