Oil prices rose on Friday on the possibility that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will refer Iran to the UN Security Council over its nuclear program.
Price gains were limited, though, as the US has said it is not now seeking sanctions against Iran, OPEC's second-largest oil producer. The IAEA board adjourned until yesterday morning without reaching a consensus.
Light, sweet crude for March delivery rose US$0.69 to US$65.37 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after sinking to as low as US$63.95 earlier in the day. The contract had dropped US$1.88 a barrel on Thursday.
March Brent futures rose US$0.51 to settle at US$63.39 a barrel on London's ICE Futures exchange.
"The market is uncertain as to what it wants to do at this point. Supply is not the issue," Alaron Trading Corp analyst Phil Flynn said, referring to ample US crude and product inventories.
"The uncertainty about Iran is the issue," Flynn said.
Participants on both sides in the IAEA meeting have said referring Iran to the UN body seemed unavoidable. The UN Security Council could impose sanctions if the agency reports Iran. Even though Iran's oil minister Kazem Vaziri Hamaneh has said Iran won't link the country's oil exports to its nuclear dispute, analysts say the issue is nevertheless a factor in the energy markets.
"Iran needs the money, and the world needs the oil," Flynn said, but any sanction against the country "would increase the anxiety and definitely increase the risk in holding futures."
Heating oil rose more than a US$0.01 to settle at US$1.7816 a gallon (US$0.47 per liter) on the NYMEX, while gasoline gained more than US$0.01 to settle at US$1.6817 a gallon. Natural gas rose US$0.266 to settle at US$8.613 per million British thermal units.
Iran claims its program is peaceful and aimed only at generating electricity, while the US and some European nations fear it could be used to develop weapons.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic gas stations are to fall NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, even though international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices continued rising last week, as the US Energy Information Administration reported a larger-than-expected drop in US commercial crude oil inventories, CPC said in a statement. Based on the company’s floating oil price formula, the cost of crude oil rose 2.38 percent last week from a week earlier, it said. News that US President Donald Trump plans a “secondary