Brent falls to three-month lows after losing seven dollars in a week

The Brent barrel has stabilized at lows for three months after having accumulated a drop of just over seven dollars in the last seven days, from the 79 dollars it was trading at on July 10 to the 72 it is trading at this Tuesday.

Brent has started this week with a drop of more than 4.31% on Monday, a decline similar to that experienced by West Texas Intermediate, the benchmark barrel for the United States, as a result of uncertainty in the crude oil market.

On July 10, when Brent was trading at highs, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo acknowledged that the country would consider exempting some countries importing Iranian crude from sanctions, despite the Trump Administration's intention to reduce Iran's oil exports to zero.

As a result of pressures from the North American country, the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) stated last week that the Islamic country would see its exports reduced by 500,000 barrels per day.

On the other hand, global supply is also affected by the situation in Libya and Venezuela, despite the agreement announced by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) last month to effectively increase ‘black gold’ production by nearly one million barrels per day.

In the case of the North African country, the state still does not have full control over all ports or oil fields, according to ‘Reuters’.

On the other hand, Venezuela saw its crude oil production reduced in June by 47,500 barrels per day, according to the monthly OPEC report on the oil market published last week. Specifically, the Caribbean country pumped 1.34 million barrels in June, which is 800,000 barrels less than the average in 2016.

EUROPA PRESS