SINGAPORE: Oil prices climbed on Wednesday, rebounding from a five-week low in the previous day, on concerns of supply disruptions after US President Donald Trump’s threats of tariffs on India over its Russian crude purchases.
Brent crude futures gained 48 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $68.12 a barrel by 9:45 a.m. Saudi time, while US West Texas Intermediate crude was up 43 cents, or 0.7 percent, at $65.59 a barrel.
“There’s still plenty of uncertainty over the US imposing secondary tariffs on buyers of Russian oil ... market chatter is growing that China’s purchases of Russian oil may come into focus next,” ING commodity strategists said on Thursday.
“If India were to stop buying Russian oil amid tariff threats, we believe the market would be able to cope with the loss of this supply,” they said, adding that the bigger risk was if other buyers also started to shun Russian oil.
Both oil contracts fell by more than $1 on Tuesday to settle at their lowest in five weeks, marking a fourth session of losses, on oversupply concerns from OPEC+’s planned September output hike.
