Oil up on Saudi support, China; poll shows less OPEC output

Feb 29, 2016, 20:38

In London, Brent North Sea crude for April advanced 23 cents to United States dollars 35.33 a barrel compared with Friday's close.

Countering that, Iran said on Monday its oil exports rose over the past month, climbing as high as 1.75 million bpd.

Hedge funds and other speculators have increased net-long positions in WTI futures and options to the highest level since November, U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission data show.

Data on manufacturing activity in China will help set the tone for this week's oil price movements, said Sanjeev Gupta, head of the Asia-Pacific Oil and Gas Practice at EY.

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Oversupply and tepid demand growth have pushed down prices by around 70% since mid-2014.

Investors had indeed reacted positively at first Friday at the announcement yesterday by the Venezuelan Minister of a new meeting of oil in mid-March between his country, Saudi Arabia, Qatar - all three members the Organization of petroleum exporting countries (OPEC) - and Russian Federation, raising hopes of new measures to curb excess supply weighing on the market, but were quickly changed their minds.

Elsewhere, crude oil for April delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange shed 29 cents, or 0.88%, to trade at $32.49 a barrel.

Strong demand should start to cut into an oil glut around the end of this year, even as new Iranian supplies enter the market and doubts persist over whether major oil producers will reduce output, BP's chief economist said on February 24. The amount of open positions in USA crude contracts betting on a further fall in prices has fallen more than 17 percent since mid-February to the lowest level in 2016. "We hope that they [OPEC] can get together to decrease their production". At 1635 GMT, three-month futures contracts of nickel (up 0.2%), lead (up 1.8%), tin (up 0.2%) and primary aluminium (up 1.3%) headed higher, but the copper contract shed 0.5%.

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"It's the Saudis turn to talk up the market today", said John Kilduff, a partner at Again Capital LLC, a New York-based hedge fund that focuses on energy.

The Reuters poll indicated that Opec output fell by 280,000 barrels per day (bpd) from January.

However, Morgan Stanley added that the agreement between the world's two biggest oil producers wouldn't deal with the 1-2 million barrels per day production overhang.

Crude futures rose in early trading on Monday after gaining over 15 per cent last week, with some indicators pointing to the possibility the market is showing signs of bottoming out.

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- Nicole Friedman and Harriet Torry contributed to this article.