Crude oil rises on concerns over Middle East supply disruptions By Investing.com

Investing.com — Oil prices rose on Thursday on fears that escalating conflict in the Middle East could disrupt crude flows from the key exporting region.

By 08:40 ET (1240 GMT), futures were trading 2.2 percent higher at $71.61 a barrel, and the contract was up 1.9 percent at $75.33 a barrel. barrel.

Oil rises on Middle East tensions

Crude benchmarks continue to rise as traders await Israel’s response if Iran fires more than 180 missiles into its territory, given the potential for any response to target Iranian oil infrastructure, hitting supplies to a senior OPEC member .

“There have been suggestions that Israel could target Iranian oil facilities, which would have the potential to push oil prices significantly higher, depending on the scale of the attack,” analysts at ING said in a note.

“Iran exports about 1.7 MB/d of crude oil, so the potential impact is significant,” ING added. “However, an attack on oil facilities may disturb the US, especially as we approach elections. A more limited response would be to strike the launch sites used for the recent missile attack, while a significant escalation would be if Israel decided to target Iran’s nuclear facilities.”

OPEC+ keeps production unchanged

Members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies, a group known as OPEC+, met on Wednesday and recommended no change in production policy.

The group is scheduled to increase production by 180,000 barrels per day each month starting in December.

“The only thing mentioned about the geopolitical situation and the conflict was the hope for non-escalation,” an OPEC+ source familiar with the talks said, according to Reuters.

While OPEC has enough available capacity to offset the loss of Iranian supplies, much of that capacity is in the Middle East’s Gulf region and is potentially vulnerable if the conflict escalates further, UBS analyst Giovanni Staunovo said.

US crude stocks rise – EIA

U.S. crude inventories rose 3.9 million barrels to 417 million barrels in the week ended Sept. 27, the Energy Information Administration said on Wednesday, compared with expectations for a 1.3 million barrel decline.