Crude oil dropped after a report showed the US jobless rate at a 25-year high, adding to concern fuel demand will slide further.
Oil fell as much as 3.1 percent after the US Labor Department said the economy lost more than 650,000 jobs for a fourth consecutive month. Total daily fuel demand averaged over the past four weeks reached the lowest since October, the US Energy Department said on Wednesday.
“If the turnaround in the economy isn’t going to happen as soon as people had hoped, then oil remains under pressure, and we’ll start testing the lows from the beginning of the year, back below US$35,” said Addison Armstrong, director of market research at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut.
Crude oil for May delivery fell US$0.13, or 0.3 percent, to settle at US$52.51 a barrel at 2:49pm on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil has risen US$0.13 this week, for a seventh consecutive gain. That’s the longest stretch of increases since July 2007. Prices are up 18 percent this year.
Crude rose 8.8 percent on Thursday, driven by the G20 plan to foster global economic recovery. It touched US$32.70 in intraday trading on Jan. 20.
Total daily fuel demand was 18.9 million barrels in the four weeks ended March 27, down 4.4 percent from a year earlier, according to the US Energy Department.
Lower demand by refiners is prompting some sellers to reduce prices.
Saudi Arabia may lower prices for crude oil sold to Asia for the first time in four months as processing profits declined, refinery officials said. Saudi Arabian Oil Co, the world’s largest oil producer, may cut its Arab Heavy and Arab Medium oil grades, according to a survey of refiners in Taiwan, Singapore, Japan and China. Saudi Aramco, as the company is also known, is expected to provide prices next week.
Brent crude oil for May settlement climbed US$0.72, or 1.4 percent, to US$53.47 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures Europe exchange.
The Brent contract had risen 10 percent in the past two days and is now US$0.96 a barrel more expensive than May crude traded on the NYMEX, the most since Feb. 24.
MORE VISITORS: The Tourism Administration said that it is seeing positive prospects in its efforts to expand the tourism market in North America and Europe Taiwan has been ranked as the cheapest place in the world to travel to this year, based on a list recommended by NerdWallet. The San Francisco-based personal finance company said that Taiwan topped the list of 16 nations it chose for budget travelers because US tourists do not need visas and travelers can easily have a good meal for less than US$10. A bus ride in Taipei costs just under US$0.50, while subway rides start at US$0.60, the firm said, adding that public transportation in Taiwan is easy to navigate. The firm also called Taiwan a “food lover’s paradise,” citing inexpensive breakfast stalls
TRADE: A mandatory declaration of origin for manufactured goods bound for the US is to take effect on May 7 to block China from exploiting Taiwan’s trade channels All products manufactured in Taiwan and exported to the US must include a signed declaration of origin starting on May 7, the Bureau of Foreign Trade announced yesterday. US President Donald Trump on April 2 imposed a 32 percent tariff on imports from Taiwan, but one week later announced a 90-day pause on its implementation. However, a universal 10 percent tariff was immediately applied to most imports from around the world. On April 12, the Trump administration further exempted computers, smartphones and semiconductors from the new tariffs. In response, President William Lai’s (賴清德) administration has introduced a series of countermeasures to support affected
CROSS-STRAIT: The vast majority of Taiwanese support maintaining the ‘status quo,’ while concern is rising about Beijing’s influence operations More than eight out of 10 Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework for cross-strait relations, according to a survey released by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Thursday. The MAC’s latest quarterly survey found that 84.4 percent of respondents opposed Beijing’s “one country, two systems” formula for handling cross-strait relations — a figure consistent with past polling. Over the past three years, opposition to the framework has remained high, ranging from a low of 83.6 percent in April 2023 to a peak of 89.6 percent in April last year. In the most recent poll, 82.5 percent also rejected China’s
PLUGGING HOLES: The amendments would bring the legislation in line with systems found in other countries such as Japan and the US, Legislator Chen Kuan-ting said Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) has proposed amending national security legislation amid a spate of espionage cases. Potential gaps in security vetting procedures for personnel with access to sensitive information prompted him to propose the amendments, which would introduce changes to Article 14 of the Classified National Security Information Protection Act (國家機密保護法), Chen said yesterday. The proposal, which aims to enhance interagency vetting procedures and reduce the risk of classified information leaks, would establish a comprehensive security clearance system in Taiwan, he said. The amendment would require character and loyalty checks for civil servants and intelligence personnel prior to
RSS