Oil in yo-yo mode; U.S. stockpile game briefly offsets China gloom

Investing.com -- The longs in crude might not be killing it but the “vol-players” certainly are.

Oil prices regained Tuesday all that they lost in the previous session as attention shifted from the gloom over the Chinese economy to the bright and shine that the weekly report on U.S. petroleum inventories would supposedly bring.

At the time of writing, inventories of U.S. crude were forecast to have dropped by just under a million barrels for last week versus a build in fuels — not great for market fundamentals but enough for those playing the volatility game to profit.

“There are virtually no headlines that moved the needle today for oil,” said John Kilduff, partner at New York energy hedge fund Again Capital. “But Wall Street is up on more U.S. data indicating an easing in inflation and that’s good enough for the swing macro players in oil to play the yo-yo game by reversing yesterday’s losses in crude.”

New York-based West Texas Intermediate, or WTI, crude settled up $1.60, or 2.2%, at $75.75 per barrel. The U.S. crude benchmark dropped 1.7% on Monday to finish at $74.15 — its weakest closing price since July 10.

London-based Brent settled up $1.13, or 1.4%, at $78.50, also for its poorest finish in a week. In the previous session, the global crude benchmark was down 1.7% at $74.15 — also its poorest closing in a week.

Crude prices tumbled in two previous sessions after China’s economic data again lagged expectations, raising questions on whether demand for oil will actually hit record highs this year if the top importer of the commodity remains in its current flux. A partial restart of halted Libyan output also added to the dour mood among crude longs.

Helping the macro trade on Tuesday was data showing U.S. retail sales rose by 0.2% in June, without a commensurate rise in inflation. While the numbers were lower than the growth in May and April, it was still a sign that the American economy was expanding — not contracting — without encouraging the Federal Reserve to aggressively add to rate hikes.

Market participants were also on the lookout for U.S. weekly oil inventory data, due after market settlement from API, or the American Petroleum Institute.

The API will release at approximately 16:30 ET (20:30 GMT) a snapshot of closing balances on U.S. crude, gasoline and distillates for the week ended July 14. The numbers serve as a precursor to official inventory data on the same due from the U.S. Energy Information Administration on Wednesday.

For last week, analysts tracked by Investing.com expect the EIA to report a crude stockpile draw of 0.905 million barrels, versus the 5.946M barrel rise reported during the week to July 7.

Gasoline inventories are expected to be little changed, similar to the previous week. Automotive fuel gasoline is the No. 1 U.S. fuel product.

With distillate stockpiles, the expectation is for a climb of 0.493M barrels versus the prior week’s gain of 4.815M. Distillates are refined into heating oil, diesel for trucks, buses, trains and ships and fuel for jets.