The US Coast Guard is also pursuing an oil tanker in international waters near Venezuela, in what would be the second such operation this weekend and the third in less than two weeks if successful, officials told Reuters on Sunday.
The recovery in oil prices has been fueled by geopolitical developments, starting with US President Donald Trump’s announcement of a “total and complete” blockade of sanctioned Venezuelan oil tankers and subsequent developments there, followed by reports of a Ukrainian drone attack on a Russian ‘shadow fleet’ ship in the Mediterranean, IG analyst Tony Sycamore said.
“The market is losing hope that the US-mediated peace talks between Russia and Ukraine will soon lead to a lasting agreement,” Sycamore said.
“These developments help offset ongoing concerns about oversupply, and combined with last week’s false decline, which caught the market off track, the balance of risks is very close to a return to the upside in crude.”
Brent and WTI fell about 1% last week, after both crude benchmarks fell about 4% in the week of December 8. US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff said on Sunday that talks between US, European and Ukrainian officials over the past three days in Florida aimed at ending Russia’s war in Ukraine had focused on aligning positions. Those meetings and separate talks with Russian negotiators had been productive, he said.
However, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s top foreign policy aide said on Sunday that changes made by the Europeans and Ukraine to US proposals for an end to the war in Ukraine have not improved the prospects for peace.
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