Crude oil futures with most powerful week in 4 years
The crude oil futures recorded their best week since February 2011, growing with over 7% and returning above the psychological barrier of 50 USD per barrel. The WTI crude oil with March delivery rose sharply by 2.4% on Friday, closing trade at 51.69 USD per barrel. For the week, the price of the commodity increased with 7.15%, taking into account the second consecutive weekly increase. The price of US oil WTI fell by 52% from the last record high of 107.50 USD per barrel reached in June 2014.
Meanwhile, the London Brent oil with April delivery jumped with 2.03% on Friday to settle at 58.68 USD per barrel in late trading. Weekly the contracts rose with 9.08% for the second consecutive weekly advance. For the past two weeks Brent crude oil added 17.7% to its value, reaching its biggest two-week increase since 1998. The price of the asset, however, is down 49% since June.
Thus the spread between Brent and WTI rose to 6.99 USD per barrel at the end of trading on Friday compared to 4.75 USD the previous week.
The number of platforms for oil production in the US fell by 87 more over the past week to 1136 - the lowest level since December 2011 figure declined in 14 of the past 17 weeks after record from 1609 to the middle of October.
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