Morning Market Overview

With nothing new on the fundamental side Thursday the oil complex traded in positive territory throughout the session driven primarily by a strong rally in the global equity markets while the US Dollar Index traded either side of unchanged.

The externals were a positive as well as the fundamentals after yesterday’s EIA weekly inventory report reported inventories remaining in a destocking pattern. With the exchanges closed today for Good Friday, there was also a bit of book squaring going on in all the markets ahead of a long holiday weekend.

The complex ended with another weekly gain as the market risk is still to the upside with improving fundamentals and a growing geopolitical risk in the Middle East. On the financial front global equity markets were mostly higher around the world with the US markets trading higher throughout the session.

The EMI Index increased by 1.23 percent with the year to date gain now at 2.1 percent. Two of the ten bourses in the Index are still in positive territory for 2018. London is in the worst performing spot in the Index with Brazil in the top spot with an 11.9 percent gain for the year. The higher value direction in global equity markets was a positive price driver for the oil complex.

On the currency front, the US dollar Index was slightly higher for the day with the Yen/USD and the Euro/USD mixed. Overall the currency markets were a neutral price driver for the oil complex