Oil rises 3% as demand worries ease amid fewer new coronavirus cases - Reuters

Oil rises 3% as demand worries ease amid fewer new coronavirus cases - Reuters:

Oil prices rose 3% on Wednesday as China reported its lowest daily number of new coronavirus cases since late January, stoking investor hopes that fuel demand in the world’s second-largest oil consumer may begin to recover.

Prices held gains, as the U.S. government’s report of a larger-than-forecast weekly build in crude inventories was countered by a decline in fuel stocks, including an unexpected gasoline drawdown.[EIA/S]

Crude inventories USOILC=ECI rose 7.5 million barrels last week, the Energy Information Administration said, compared with analysts’ expectations in a Reuters poll for a 3 million-barrel rise.

“Gasoline demand is starting to rebound, and the modest drawdown in refined fuels helped to offset the bearish, blaring crude oil headline,” said John Kilduff, a partner at Again Capital in New York.

Brent crude LCOc1 was up $1.82, or 3.3%, at $55.83 per barrel at 10:42 a.m. EST (1542 GMT). U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) CLc1 rose $1.40 a barrel, or 2.8%, to $51.34 a barrel.