OIL PRICES: NOT ABOVE $69 YET

REUTERS, BLOOMBERG - Oil prices climbed on Monday, pushed higher by comments from Saudi Arabia that cooperation between oil producers who are currently withholding supplies would continue beyond 2018.

Strong global economic growth and a drop in U.S. drilling activity also supported crude, traders said. 

Brent crude futures were at $68.89 a barrel at 0315 GMT, up 25 cents, or 0.4 percent, from their last close. Brent on Jan. 15 rose to $70.37, its highest since December 2014. 

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at $63.61 a barrel, up 24 cents, or 0.4 percent, from their last settlement. WTI climbed to $64.89 on Jan. 16, also its highest since December 2014. 

Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil exporter and de-facto leader of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), said on Sunday major oil producers were in agreement they should continue cooperating on production after their deal on supply cuts expires this year. 

"There is a readiness to continue cooperation beyond 2018...The mechanism hasn't been determined yet, but there is a consensus to continue," Saudi Arabia's Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih said in Oman. 

A group of oil producers including OPEC and Russia, the world's biggest crude producer, started to withhold production in January last year to prop up prices. The deal is set to expire at the end of 2018. 

In the United States, declining drilling activity for new oil production further supported crude. 

U.S. drillers cut five oil rigs in the week to Jan. 19, bringing the count down to 747, energy services firm Baker Hughes said on Friday. 

Despite this, the rig count in 2017 and early this year remains much higher than in 2016, resulting in a 16 percent rise in U.S. production since mid-2016, to 9.75 million barrels per day. 

Beyond supplies, strong global economic growth was also supporting oil prices. 

"During the last four quarters, the underlying global growth dynamic began to shift... Global growth has become synchronized and accelerated above trend," U.S. bank Morgan Stanley said over the weekend in a note. 

In the latest indicator, Japanese manufacturing sentiment in January jumped to an 11-year high, the Reuters Tankan poll showed on Monday, highlighting the optimism driven by nearly two years of economic expansion. 

Despite the well supported market, analysts warned oil markets had lost some steam since their peak early last week. 

Bernstein Energy said on Monday that oil inventories might start rising soon due to a slowdown in demand which typically happens at the end of the northern hemisphere winter. 

"We expect... an end to the strong (inventory) draws we have seen... With the strong correlation between inventories and crude prices, this perhaps means we should expect crude prices to moderate in the near term," Bernstein said.

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Earlier:

2018, January, 17, 23:50:00 OIL PRICES: NOT ABOVE $70 YET REUTERS - Brent crude futures LCOc1 were at $69.23 a barrel at 0808 GMT, up 8 cents from their last close, but down from a high of $69.37 earlier in the day. Brent on Monday rose to $70.37 a barrel, its highest since December 2014, the start of a three-year oil price slump. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were at $63.84 a barrel, down from a high of $63.89 earlier, but up 11 cents from their last settlement. WTI hit $64.89 on Tuesday, also the highest since December 2014. Русский | English

2018, January, 12, 13:05:00 OIL PRICES: NOT ABOVE $70 REUTERS - U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were at $63.34 a barrel at 0755 GMT, down 46 cents, or 0.7 percent, from their last settlement. WTI the day before rose to its strongest since late 2014 at $64.77. Brent crude futures LCOc1 were at $68.97 a barrel, down 29 cents, or 0.4 percent, from their last close. Brent also marked a December-2014 high the previous day, at $70.05 a barrel.

2018, January, 10, 13:05:00 OIL PRICES: $60 - $61 EIA - Brent crude oil prices averaged $54/b in 2017 and are forecast to average $60/b in 2018 and $61/b in 2019. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil spot prices are forecast to average $4/b less than Brent prices in both 2018 and 2019. EIA’s forecast for the average WTI price for December 2018 of $58/b should be considered in the context of NYMEX contract values for December 2018 delivery. NYMEX contract values traded during the five-day period ending January 4 suggest that a range of $40/b to $85/b encompasses the market expectation for WTI prices in December 2018 at the 95% confidence level.

2018, January, 4, 12:30:00 OIL PRICES: ABOVE $68 REUTERS - U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were at $62.16 a barrel at 0752 GMT, up 53 cents, or 0.9 percent, from their last close. They touched $62.21 shortly before, their highest level since May 2015. Brent crude futures LCOc1 - the international benchmark for oil prices - were at $68.23 a barrel, up 39 cents, or 0.9 percent, after revisiting a May 2015 high of $68.27 shortly before.

2018, January, 3, 16:05:00 OIL PRICES: ABOVE $66 YET REUTERS - U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures CLc1 were at $60.50 a barrel at 1017 GMT, up 13 cents from their last close, though still not far off the $60.74 reached on the previous day that was the highest since June 2015. Brent crude futures LCOc1 - the international benchmark for oil prices - were at $66.74 a barrel, up 17 cents but still trailing Tuesday’s high of $67.29 that was the most since May 2015.

2017, December, 29, 11:45:00 OIL PRICES: ABOVE $66 AGAIN REUTERS - U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at $60.30 a barrel at 0504 GMT, up 46 cents or 0.8 percent from their last close, the highest since June 2015. Brent crude futures - the international benchmark - were also up, rising 45 cents or 0.7 percent to $66.61 a barrel. Brent broke through $67 earlier this week for the first time since May 2015. Русский | English

2017, December, 22, 23:05:00 OIL PRICE: NOT ABOVE $65 REUTERS - U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were at $58.16 a barrel at 0755 GMT, down 20 cents, or 0.3 percent, from their last settlement. Brent crude futures, the international benchmark for oil prices, were at $64.81 a barrel, down 19 cents, or 0.1 percent. Русский | English