Nicole Jao
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Oil prices rose nearly 3% on supply on Monday as producer group OPEC+ decided not to speed up plans for Canadian oil-producing provinces to disrupt production and wildfires.
Brent crude futures settled $1.85, or 2.95%, at $64.63 per barrel. The U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude oil received $1.73, or 2.85%, to $62.52.
As of Monday, wildfires burned in the Alberta oil production province in Canada affected 7% of the country's overall crude oil production, according to Reuters' calculations.
At least two hot oil sands operators evacuated from their sites over the weekend, south of Fort McMurray's industry hub and shut down production with preventive measures.
“Wildfires in Alberta are now starting to seep into,” said John Kilduff, partner of New York’s capital again.
Also supporting prices, the dollar shrank across the board on Monday over fears that Trump's new tariff threat could hurt growth and Stoke inflation.
Goods with weaker U.S. currencies make buyers using other currencies cheaper.
Jorge Leon of Rystad Energy said perceptions of increased geopolitical risks were also supported after Ukrainian drones went on strike against Russia over the weekend.
Meanwhile, a mixed signal of the Iran-US talk puts market participants on the edge. An Iranian diplomat said Monday that Iran is expected to reject a U.S. proposal to end a decades-old nuclear dispute. The delegations from both countries made some progress after the fifth round of negotiations held in Rome last month.
The group of oil exporters and their allies, collectively known as OPEC+, decided to increase production by 411,000 barrels per day in July, the third consecutive increase in that number as it hopes to retrace market share and punish more members than their quota.
Sources familiar with OPEC+ talks said Friday that the group could discuss a bigger increase.
Oil traders say Brent and WTI futures are already at 411,000 BPD.
Phil Flynn, a senior analyst at Price Futures Group, said investors expect the oil production group to exceed its growth. “I think they were caught in the wrong way.”
Goldman Sachs analysts expect OPEC+ to implement the final 410,000 BPD production in August.
"Relatively tight oil basics, hard global activity data and support for oil demand in the seasonal summer suggest that the expected slowdown in demand is unlikely to be sharp enough to stop production when the August production levels are determined on July 6," the bank said in a note.
Morgan Stanley analysts also said they expect to increase by 411,000 bpd per month to a total of 2.2 million bpd by October.
"With this latest announcement, there is little indication that quota growth is slowing," the bank's analyst said.
(Reported by Nicole Jao in New York, Robert Harvey in London, and Tan and Michele Pek in Florence in Singapore; Editors of David Goodman, Tomasz Janowski, David Evans, Andrea Ricci and Rod Nickel)