The Sep’25 Brent futures contract has seen a choppy afternoon, albeit still rangebound around $68/bbl. Prices finally broke above $69/bbl around 16:30 BST and stand at $69.36/bbl at 17:35 BST (time of writing), where they appear to be meeting resistance. Brazilian NOC Petrobras is reportedly considering redirecting the oil it sells to the United States, choosing instead to send more oil to Asia and Pacific markets due to US higher tariffs announced on Brazil, as per a comment made by Petrobras CEO Magda Chambriard to Reuters. In other news, a Reuters exclusive showed that Saudi Arabian NOC Saudi Aramco is close to a deal raising around $10 billion via a group led by BlackRock that has been set up to invest in the NOC’s Jafurah gas project. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia’s seaborne oil outflows averaged at 6.43mb/d in the first half of July, as per vessel tracking data compiled by Bloomberg. This figure places total flows to destinations outside the kingdom on course for a 16-month high. In macro news, initial claims for unemployment benefits fell by 7,000 to 221,000 claims in the week ending 12 Jul, as per the US Labor Department. Finally, at the time of writing, the Sep/Oct’25 and Sep/Mar’26 Brent futures spreads stand at $0.99/bbl and $2.73/bbl, respectively.
