Oil futures prices rise moderately, continuing yesterday's trend. The market has a report on US petroleum reserves, which have a smaller-than-expected increase in crude oil stocks.

Further price increases constrain news of the completion of a three-day strike of Kuwaiti oil. According to Kuwait increased production to 1.6 million barrels per day compared to 1.1 million barrels per day on Sunday. However, such production volumes are still significantly below the March figure of 2.8 million barrels per day. "Kuwait is returned to full production, and we expected that oil will fall even further after the failure of the Doha meeting", - said the chief raw SEB analyst Bjarne Shildrop. Recall oil-producing countries following the meeting in Doha on April 17 failed to come to an agreement on freezing oil production. The next time a possible freeze of production will be discussed at the OPEC meeting in Vienna in June.

Meanwhile, the US Department of Energy reported that in the week of April 9-15, oil stocks rose 2.1 million barrels to 538.6 million barrels (historic high for this time of year). Analysts had expected an increase of reserves by 2.5 million. Barrels. Oil reserves in Cushing terminal fell 248,000 barrels to 64.3 million barrels. Gasoline inventories fell by 110,000 barrels to 239.7 million barrels. Analysts had expected a drop of 1.5 million barrels. Distillate stocks fell by 3.6 million barrels to 159.9 million barrels. Analysts predicted that distillate stocks remain unchanged. Meanwhile, refining capacity utilization rate increased by 0.2% to 89.4%. Analysts expected an increase of 0.1%. Also, the data showed that oil production in the US in the week April 9-15, fell to 8.953 million barrels per day versus 8.977 million barrels the previous week. Recall yesterday's report from the American Petroleum Institute (API) showed that crude oil inventories last week rose by 3.1 mln. Barrels, while analysts had expected growth of 2.4 million. Barrels. Oil reserves in Cushing terminal fell by 0.2 million barrels, gasoline inventories -.. By 1.02 million barrels, while distillate stocks - by 2.3 million barrels..

WTI for delivery in May rose to $42.77 a barrel. Brent for May rose to $44.53 a barrel.

Gold futures again traded in the green zone after a moderate decline in the first half of trading, despite the significant strengthening of the US dollar.

"Concerns about China's support gold in the beginning of the year, but now has increased the influence of other factors. Expectation of rising inflation in the United States and the possibility of negative interest rates in Japan and the eurozone This should increase the demand for gold, - said an analyst at Capital Economics Simon Gambarini - Gold can. rise in price to $ 1,350 per troy ounce. "

This year gold has risen in price by 18%, as investors prefer safe assets on the background of anxiety in relation to a global economic slowdown. Meanwhile, expectations that the Fed will stick to a cautious approach to tightening monetary policy, also support the demand for the precious metal. Recall increase in interest rates will boost the dollar, making it more attractive to investors, but it will put pressure on gold, making it more expensive for buyers in other currencies.

Little influenced by the current US statistics. The National Association of Realtors reported that home sales in the secondary market rose in March and were slightly higher compared with a year earlier. The total volume of home sales in the secondary market jumped 5.1 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate reached 5.33 million compared with the revised downward the level of 5.07 million in February. Sales rose in all four major regions last month and were 1.5 percent higher than in March 2015.

Lawrence Yun, the NAR chief economist, said that home sales in the secondary market showed a good recovery in March following an uncharacteristically large decline in February. Total reserves of housing in the end of March increased by 5.9 percent to 1.98 million homes, but still 1.5 percent lower than a year ago (2.01 million). At the current sales rate 4.5 months is required to sell stocks in the market, as compared with 4.4 months in February.

The cost of the June gold futures on the COMEX today rose by $ 1.2 to $ 1255.5 per ounce.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Wednesday that he was not confident if oil producers could agree to freeze the oil production at the meeting in June. He noted that Saudi Arabia had a capacity to rise its oil output, adding that Russia was also able to increase its oil output.

Novak noted that it could happen that there would be no need in a deal on the freeze on the oil output in June as the oil market could start to rebalance.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its crude oil inventories data on Wednesday. U.S. crude inventories rose by 2.08 million barrels to 538.6 million in the week to April 15.

Analysts had expected U.S. crude oil inventories to rise by 2.5 million barrels.

Gasoline inventories decreased by 110,000 barrels, according to the EIA.

Crude stocks at the Cushing, Oklahoma, declined by 248,000 barrels.

U.S. crude oil imports climbed by 247,000 barrels per day.

Refineries in the U.S. were running at 89.4% of capacity, up from 89.2% the previous week.

Oil production fell by 0.3% last week to 8.953 million barrels a day from 8.977 in the previous week.

(raw materials / closing price /% change)

Oil 40.96 -0.29%

Gold 1,251.80 -0.20%