By Thompson ABISOLA
Oil prices rose on Monday as U.S. markets tightened just weeks ahead of Washington’s plan to impose new sanctions against Iran.
Brent crude futures were at 79.84 dollars per barrel .
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures rose to 71.52 dollars a barrel.
Some oil pricing interested stakeholders predict oil to rise to 100 dollars in January 2019.
The market was “increasingly concerned about dwindling (U.S.) inventories,” ANZ bank said on Monday.
U.S. commercial crude oil inventories C-STK-T-EIA are at their lowest level since early 2015.
While output C-OUT-T-EIA remains around the record of 11 million barrels per day (bpd), recent subdued U.S. drilling activity points towards a slowdown.
The tightening U.S. market came ahead of sanctions that Washington plans to implement against Iran’s petroleum exports from early November.
Many analysts expect the sanctions to result in a drop of more than one million bpd of crude exports.
The Middle East dominated Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), of which Iran is a member, as well as top producer Russia, are discussing raising output by 500,000 bpd to counter falling supply from Iran, although the discussions are not finalised.
