Oil prices edged lower in Asian trade on Wednesday, easing from two-week highs as the recent OPEC+ hike and renewed trade tensions weighed on the demand outlook, despite ongoing Canadian supply disruptions offering support.
At 3:10 pm AEST (5:10 am GMT) Brent crude futures fell $0.26 or 0.4% to US$65.37 per barrel, while United States West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude dropped $0.27 or 0.4% to $63.14 per barrel.
The decline followed a nearly 2% rally on Tuesday, when both benchmarks reached two-week highs on fears of production losses from Canadian wildfires and expectations that Iran would reject a U.S. nuclear proposal.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed Monday that U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping are expected to speak this week. This is shortly after Trump accused China of backtracking on tariff and trade reduction commitments.
Concerns over global economic growth also lingered after the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on Tuesday downgraded its global growth forecast, citing mounting damage from Trump’s trade war to the U.S. economy.
On the data front, the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported that U.S. crude inventories fell by 3.3 million barrels in the week ending May 30, a sharper draw than the 900,000-barrel drop expected.
