Oil down ahead of US data

Crude oil prices remained lower on Tuesday, as traders were eyeing the release of this week’s U.S. stockpile data, although the sentiment that the market is gradually re-balancing continued to lend some support.

The U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude November contract was at $50.27 a barrel, down 19 cents or about 0.38% by 9:00 a.m. ET (13:00 GMT), just off the previous session’s two-week low of $50.08.

Elsewhere, Brent oil for November delivery on the ICE Futures Exchange in London was down 35 cents or about 0.62% at $55.77 a barrel, not far from Monday’s one-week trough of $55.78.

The Energy Information Administration will release its weekly report on Wednesday, amid forecasts for an oil-stock drop of around 0.5 million barrels, which would mark the second weekly decline in a row.

Crude prices remained under pressure after data on Friday showed that U.S. energy companies added oil rigs for the first time in seven weeks last week.

The commodity had been well supported in recent weeks amid growing optimism that the crude market was well on its way towards rebalancing as data showed strong compliance from major producers with their supply cut agreement.

In May, <a href=’https://theenergyyear.com/companies-institutions/<a href=’https://theenergyyear.com/companies-institutions/opec/’>opec/’>OPEC and non-OPEC members led by Russia agreed to extend production cuts of 1.8 million barrels per day for a period of nine months until March 2018 in a bid to reduce global oil inventories and support oil prices.

Elsewhere, gasoline futures dropped 0.43% to $1.548 a gallon, while natural gas futures lost 0.72% to $2.909 per million British thermal units.