Oil struck fresh five-year lows this week on the back of a strong US dollar, oversupply fears and major producer Saudi Arabia slashing its export prices.
The market had already dived last week after OPEC left its output ceiling unchanged, despite a global supply glut. Crude futures have now slumped by about 40 percent since June.
Weak economic data added to the pressure, with worse-than-expected manufacturing figures in China, the world’s largest energy consumer.
Commodities were also hit late on Friday as the greenback rallied on data showing the US economy created 321,000 new jobs last month, exceeding expectations.
OIL: Crude futures sank to fresh five-year lows on Monday, with New York crude hitting US$63.72 a barrel — the lowest level since July 2009.
London Brent oil hit an October 2009 low of US$67.53 a barrel, before staging a technical rebound.
Oil dipped on Tuesday after the Iraqi government and autonomous Kurds struck a deal that will boost the nation’s crude oil exports to an already oversupplied market.
The oil market diverged Wednesday as traders digested a drop in US crude inventories, but on Thursday and Friday, it hit reverse gear again, dented by reports that Saudi Arabia has trimmed its export prices and is doing nothing to tighten supplies.
By Friday on London’s Intercontinental Exchange, Brent North Sea crude for delivery next month sank to US$68.36 a barrel compared with US$73.05 one week earlier.
On the New York Mercantile Exchange, West Texas Intermediate, or light sweet crude, dived to US$65.31 a barrel from US$69.13.
PRECIOUS METALS: Gold advanced as dealers shrugged off the rallying US dollar and brighter-than-anticipated non-farm payrolls data.
By Friday on the London Bullion Market, the price of gold rose to US$1,194 an ounce from US$1,182.75 a week earlier, while silver gained to US$16.33 an ounce from US$15.97.
On the London Platinum and Palladium Market, platinum stood at US$1,231 against US$1,205. Palladium fell to US$806 from US$809.
COCOA: Prices forged ahead this week as traders shrugged off supply jitters for the commodity that is mostly used to produce chocolate.
By Friday on LIFFE, London’s futures exchange, cocoa for delivery in March rose to £1,922 a tonne from £1,901 a week earlier.
On the ICE Futures US exchange, cocoa for March increased to US$2,887 a tonne from US$2,862.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)