Home ›› 09 Sep 2021 ›› World Biz
Oil prices rose on Wednesday as U.S. Gulf of Mexico producers made slow progress in rebuilding output, although gains were capped by a stronger dollar and concerns about the impact on demand of rising coronavirus infections.
Brent was up 60 cents, or 0.8%, at $72.29 a barrel, at 1002 GMT, and U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude rose 70 cents, or 1%, to $69.05 a barrel.
"Oil prices are continuing to find support from the ongoing high production outages in the Gulf of Mexico," said Commerzbank analyst Carsten Fritsch.
Producers in the Gulf are still struggling to restart operations nine days after Hurricane Ida swept through the region with powerful winds and drenching rain.
About 80% of U.S. Gulf production remained offline on Tuesday, with 79 production platforms still unoccupied. About 17.5 million barrels of oil has been lost to the market so far.
The Gulf's offshore wells make up about 17% of U.S. output. "Refinery operations appear to be making a quicker recovery," ING analysts said in a note.
