U.S. rig count climbs again to 653

To subscribe to JAM you need to fill in some details below including, ahem, some info on how you'll pay us. A subscription is $199 (although if you're subscribing with one of our special offers it will be lower) for a year for ongoing and continuing access to the...

Oil continues to rally but oil stocks run out of fuel and tech stocks drag down S&P

After yesterday’s surprise agreement to cut production from OPEC, oil prices have continued to climb–West Texas Intermediate was up 3.07% to $50.96 as of 3:15 p.m. New York time this afternoon–but oil producer stocks have stalled with such leaders from yesterday as Pioneer Natural Resources (PXD) down 0.84%, Parsley Energy off 1%, and RSP Permian (RSPP) lower by 1.46%.

OPEC’s agreement to cut oil production is much stronger than Wall Street expected and oil prices soar

Yesterday I wrote that the financial markets’ reaction to whatever came out of OPEC’s meeting today would depend on how weak or strong the agreement to cut production was. Well, the actual agreement announced today to cut oil production was far stronger than expected. That surprise sent oil markets soaring today with U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate up 8.34% to $49.00 a barrel. The Brent benchmark rose 8.82% to $50.47 a barrel.

Is the short squeeze that drove up the price of some energy stocks Wednesday just about over?

It looks like “No deal” to raise oil prices at OPEC meeting tomorrow

Ahead of tomorrow’s OPEC “consultations” in Algiers, Saudi Arabia put an offer on the table today to reduce oil production to January levels and Iran rejected it. Iran wants to increase its current production of 3.6 million barrels a day to 4 million barrels, the level before international sanctions devastated the country’s oil exports. The Saudi offer would have reduced Saudi Arabia’s production by 500,000 barrels a day, but only if other OPEC members agreed to freeze production at current levels.