Oil Rises As China Demand Resumes, Signs That Iran Supply Curbed

Oil Rises As China Demand Resumes, Signs That Iran Supply Curbed
Oil prices gained more than 1%, ending a run of weekly declines.

U.S. energy companies cut nine oil drilling rigs this week, the biggest reduction since May 2016, General Electric Co's Baker Hughes energy services firm said. Changes in the rig count serves as an indicator of future production trends.

Traders kept an eye on the North Sea, where workers on three oil and gas platforms plan to strike next month. Oil production will stop during the strikes. The three fields contribute about 45,000 to 50,000 bpd to the North Sea's Forties and Brent crude streams.

Hedge funds and other money managers cut their bullish wagers on U.S. crude futures to the lowest level since mid-June.

The speculator group cut its combined futures and options position in New York and London by 15,723 contracts to 341,132 in the week to Aug. 21, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) said on Friday. The level was the lowest since the week ended June 19.

Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) Brent crude speculators cut their net long positions in the week by 11,985 to 324,431, the lowest in more than a year.

(Reporting by Christopher Johnson in London and Henning Gloystein in Singapore Editing by Phil Berlowitz and Alistair Bell)

Copyright 2018 Thomson Reuters.


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