After Jan’25 Brent futures initially fell from $72.80/bbl at 07:00 GMT to $72.40/bbl at 08:15 GMT this morning, the Jan’25 contract made a recovery to $73.30/bbl at 10:30 GMT (time of writing). In the news today, Ukraine’s energy minister said the country’s power infrastructure was “under massive enemy attack”, after a nationwide air raid alert was declared due to incoming missiles. In other news, Asia’s crude oil imports are expected to increase to 26.42mb/d in November, up marginally from October’s 26.11mb/d and 26.24 mb/d in September, according to data compiled by LSEG Oil Research. However, from the period January to November 2024, average Asian crude oil imports are estimated to have declined y/y by 370kb/d. Finally, OPEC+ has postponed its online meeting to discuss oil production strategy from 1 Dec to 5 Dec. OPEC’s secretariat stated the delay was because several ministers will attend the meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council in Kuwait on 1 Dec, as per Bloomberg. At the time of writing, the Jan/Feb’25 and Jan/Jul’25 Brent futures spreads stand at $0.54/bbl and $1.82/bbl, respectively.
