Recap: The oil market continued to trend lower on Friday after Oman said operations at its Mina alFahal port were proceeding normally following a report of disruption to its operations due to an explosion. The market traded lower on hopes of a de-escalation as U.S. President Donald Trump said he believed progress was being made between Israel and Lebanon. The crude market traded mostly sideways before it traded to $90.47 after Petroleum Development Oman said operations at Mina al Fahal port were not affected following an explosion near its mooring berths. The market retraced some of its losses and posted a high of $93.63 only to trade lower during the remainder of the session. The market posted a low of $89.68 in afternoon trading. The July WTI contract later settled in a sideways trading range ahead of the close and ended the session down $2.50 at $90.54. The August Brent contract settled down $1.94 at $93.03. Meanwhile, the product markets ended the session in mixed territory, with the heating oil market settling down 8.64 cents at $3.5874 and the RB market settling up 76 points at $3.0459.
Technical Analysis: The crude market will be driven by the latest headlines seen over the weekend. There is still uncertainty given the contradicting headlines regarding the progress towards peace. However, while there are hopes for a resolution to the war with Iran, the market will likely find support given the supply issues that remain. The crude market is seen finding support at $89.68, $88.45, $86.35, $86.13, $84.28 and $82.50. Meanwhile, resistance is seen at $93.63, $95.35, $95.91, $97.00 followed by $98.01, $99.43, $102.66, $104.45, $104.86 and $105.21.
Fundamental News: U.S. Energy Secretary, Chris Wright, said companies that borrowed oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve in recent months will add back an extra 40 million barrels of crude in the form of premiums after the conflict in Iran is over. He said he is not worried about stock levels in the SPR, which at 357.1 million barrels have fallen to the lowest levels in more than two years.
According to Reuters, about 400 oil storage tanks in Cushing, Oklahoma, are nearly empty, drained by refiners worldwide attempting to plug a massive shortfall in global supplies caused by war in the Middle East. Oil levels in storage tanks have fallen rapidly since the war began and Iran effectively closed tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Sources stated that Phillips 66 believes Cushing’s storage levels could reach their operational minimum. For Phillips 66 and other U.S. refiners, Cushing is a major source of crude oil to their plants in the Midwest farm belt and Gulf Coast export hub. The EIA reported that Cushing inventories fell to 22.4 million barrels as of May 29th, down about 4 million barrels compared to February 27th, the day before the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran began. According to oil storage data provider AlphaBBL, stocks fell by 500,000 barrels between May 29th and June 2nd. Jeremy Irwin, global crude lead for analytics firm Energy Aspects, said that when the level at Cushing gets below 20 million barrels, operational challenges could arise.
Baker Hughes said U.S. energy firms this week added rigs for a seventh consecutive week for the first time since May 2022. The oil and natural gas rig count increased by one to 563 in the week ending June 5th, its highest level since May 2025. Baker Hughes said oil rigs increased by two to 431 this week, the highest level since June 2025, while gas rigs fell by one to 124, the lowest level since January 2026.
IIR Energy reported that U.S. oil refiners are expected to shut in about 138,000 bpd of capacity in the week ending June 5th, increasing available refining capacity by 99,000 bpd from the previous week. Offline capacity is expected to increase to 144,000 bpd in the week ending June 12th.
Early Market Call – as of 8:40 AM EDT
WTI – July $91.91, up $1.66
RBOB – July $3.1039, up 6.2 cents
HO – July $3.6673, up 6.19 cents
