Image credit: A/S Global Risk Management

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In the weekly oil inventory report, published last night, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported a huge build in crude oil of 10.27 mio. barrels, more than 3 times higher than expected. It is the biggest weekly build since early 2017. However, distillates and gasoline inventories dropped 3.5 and 1.4 mio. barrels respectively, limiting market reactions to the data.

Along with continued talks of OPEC cutting production up to 1.4m barrels per day in 2019, equal to 1.5% of global supply, oil prices have climbed slightly and at the time of writing Brent is around $67.7.

As the OPEC meeting approaches early next month, expect increased volatility on news and comments ahead of the meeting. Whilst the focus at the last meeting in June was on supply disruption fears (and U.S. sanctions being reimposed on Iran), a supply cut will likely be the talk of the town this time around.

The EIA also reported that U.S. crude oil production is around 11.7m barrels per day - another new record. Turning to economic data, today sees Eurozone inflation and U.S. industrial production. Next week, the U.S. market is closed due to Thanksgiving Day on Thursday, and markets close early on Friday for the same reason.

Tonight, the weekly oil rig count from Baker Hughes will be followed closely after last week's jump of 12 rigs coming online to currently 886.