In the past week, the Feb’25 Brent futures contract was largely rangebound between around $71.50/bbl and $73.50/bbl, currently at $72.50/bbl at 09:15 GMT on 05 Dec (time of writing). Crude oil prices have been trading in an increasingly narrow range in recent weeks with no clear directional axe. This could be a reflection of the market taking a risk-off approach, seeking greater clarity on OPEC+ production policy ahead of their ministerial meeting on December 5, while also closely watching for any significant escalations in regional conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine. Onyx’s weekly CFTC COT predictor anticipates speculative players to add risk in Brent, while reducing their short positions for the week ending 03 Dec. Managed-by-money long positions are expected to increase by 3.4mb, compared to last week’s moderate increase of 80kb, while removing 2.3mb from their short positions. Meanwhile, prod/merc players are projected to be risk-off, reducing both long and short positions by 3.9mb and 5.1mb, respectively.
