Today in early trading, the oil price continues to slide as prospects of western countries’ military strike towards Syria seem to be less certain than it seemed a few days ago. In the UK, the House of Commons rejected the plan from Prime Minister Cameron for the use of military forces against the Syrian regime, indicating that Britain will not join any military action against Syria. Even though the White House indicated that the US would go it alone if needed, the oil price fell more than one percent yesterday and today is trading even below 115 USD/barrel.
Regarding news, the International Energy Agency said yesterday that although it is concerned with possible impacts of high oil prices on economic growth, it did not plan to release oil from emergency reserves as the oil market remained adequately supplied (despite loss of Libya’s oil, for example). Let us recall that the last release of oil from emergency stockpiles occurred during the Libyan war in summer 2011.
Base Metals
The price of the three-month contract on copper (LME) fell sharply yesterday after the revision of US GDP growth figures for the second quarter although it brought few new insights; the revision in net-exports was already known from the June trade data. While the headline figure looks significantly stronger, it is actually no real surprise. Despite the sell-off, copper may post the largest monthly gains since September 2012.
