Investing.com - Oil prices trader lower Thursday, pulling back from five-month highs, as the International Energy Agency’s monthly report shifted attention from recent supply-side issues to the uncertainty surrounding demand.
New York-traded West Texas Intermediate crude futures fell 7 cents, or 1.2%, at $63.87 a barrel by 10:59 AM ET (14:59 GMT).
Meanwhile, Brent crude futures, the benchmark for oil prices outside the U.S., traded down 40 cents, or 0.6%, to $71.33.
The IEA recognized that a surge in production seen in the second half of 2018 had finally turned around thanks to OPEC-led production curbs and U.S. sanctions on Iran and Venezuela.
While the cuts in output have served to tighten markets, sending West Texas Intermediate up around 40% so far in 2019, the IEA pointed out that demand, a “very important” piece of the equation for oil market rebalancing, was facing a wall of uncertainty given the outlook for global growth.
“As far as 2019 is concerned, amongst the analyst community there is an extraordinarily wide divergence of view as to how strong growth will be,” the IEA said in its report. “We maintain our forecast of 1.4 million barrels per day, but accept that there are mixed signals about the health of the global economy, and differing views about the likely level of oil prices.”
Also taking the wind out of bulls’ sails this week, weekly data from the Energy Information Administration showed yet another surge in U.S. crude stockpiles, while U.S. production held at a record 12.2 million bpd, cementing America’s position as the world’s largest oil producer.
In other energy trading, gasoline futures fell 1.7% to $2.0345 a gallon by 11:02 AM ET (15:02 GMT), while heating oil lost 0.5% to $2.0783 a gallon.
Lastly, natural gas futures traded down 0.3% to $2.691 per million British thermal units.