Brent oil price stable, WTI up 1% after trade resumes

HOUSTON: Brent crude oil futures were flat on Friday while U.S. crude futures ticked higher as drawn-out Russia-Ukraine peace talks kept geopolitical risks elevated and traders kept an eye on Sunday’s OPEC+ meeting for clues about potential output changes.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures resumed trading after being frozen due to a system outage at exchange operator CME Group, blamed on a cooling issue at CyrusOne data centres. Brent oil trades on the Intercontinental Exchange, or ICE.

Front-month Brent crude futures for January, which expire on Friday, were down 6 cents, or 0.09%, at $63.28 a barrel at 10:11 a.m. EDT (1511 GMT). The more active February contract changed hands at $62.96, up 9 cents, or 0.14%.

WTI crude traded at $59.23 a barrel, up 58 cents, or 0.99%, from Wednesday’s close. There was no settlement on Thursday due to the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States.

LONGEST LOSING STREAK SINCE 2023

Both contracts are headed for a fourth straight monthly loss, the longest losing streak since 2023, as expectations for higher global supply weighed on prices, despite being up more than 1% for the week.

The strength of fuel-refining profit margins has supported crude demand in some places, but the bearish impact of an expected oil surplus is pressuring prices, said Rystad analyst Janiv Shah.

A survey of 35 economists and analysts by Reuters showed that they expect Brent to average $62.23 per barrel in 2026, down from October’s forecast of $63.15. The benchmark has averaged $68.80 per barrel so far in 2025, according to LSEG data.

Signs that a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia might be close pushed oil prices down sharply earlier this week, but they have recovered over the past three sessions as negotiations dragged on.

“Futures had been anticipating some sort of a peace agreement which has kept pressure on prices. Still, little is known at this time, and a no agreement will likely mean even tighter sanctions on Russia’s oil exports,” said Dennis Kissler, senior vice president of trading at BOK Financial in a note on Friday.

On Sunday, OPEC+ is likely to leave oil output levels unchanged at its meetings and to agree on a mechanism to assess members’ maximum production capacity, two delegates from the group and a source familiar with the group’s talks told Reuters.

Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter, is expected to lower its January crude price for Asian buyers for a second month to its lowest level for five years, under pressure from ample supplies and the surplus outlook, sources told Reuters on Friday.