DTN Oil Update
Oil Jumps After Russia Halts Exports From Major Oil Hub
VIENNA (DTN) -- Oil prices jumped around 1.5% Friday morning after a Ukrainian strike on Russia's main Black Sea port forced the suspension of oil loading operations.
The NYMEX WTI contract for December delivery jumped $1.01 to $59.70 barrel (bbl), and ICE Brent for January delivery rose $0.87 to $63.88 bbl.
December RBOB gasoline futures edged up $0.0175 to $1.9772 gallon, and front-month ULSD futures advanced $0.0651 to $2.5298 gallon.
The U.S. Dollar Index was little changed, down 0.080 points to 98.970 against a basket of foreign currencies.
Ukrainian attacks reportedly damaged an oil depot and a vessel in the port of Novorossiysk. The port is one of Russia's main oil export hubs, loading more than 700,000 barrels per day (bpd) of Russian crude oil exports. It also houses the terminal for most seaborne Kazakh crude oil exports, amounting to some 1.5 million bpd. While Russia suspended exports from the port, the terminal handling Kazakh exports seems to be unaffected.
The extent of the damage and duration of the export pause remain unclear, although the newest attack fueled supply risk concerns that added to the geopolitical risk premium in oil. Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy infrastructure have so far mostly affected the downstream sector, leading to fuel shortages and fuel export bans, but barely impacting crude oil supply.
In its monthly oil market report published Thursday, the International Energy Agency flagged elevated risks to Russian crude oil supply posed by fresh U.S. and U.K. sanctions on the country's two largest oil producers, Rosneft and Lukoil, and threats of secondary sanctions on buyers of Russian energy. While Russian crude oil export volumes have so far proven resilient to sanctions, the IEA did flag rapidly swelling volumes of Russian oil on water as some cargoes struggle to find buyers ahead of the new sanctions coming into force on Nov. 21.
At the same time, the Paris-based energy watchdog raised its forecast on next year's global oil surplus to 4.09 million bpd from a prior 3.97 million bpd. This was despite OPEC+ halting output increases in the first quarter of 2026, citing historically low demand growth versus healthy output growth in non-OPEC oil production. The report also noted that global inventories expanded for the ninth consecutive month in October.
In the U.S., crude oil inventories grew more than expected last week. The U.S. Energy Information Administration on Thursday reported a 6.4 million bbl build to commercial crude oil stocks in the week ending Nov. 7. At 427.6 million bbl, inventories were 11.6 million bbl higher than two weeks earlier.
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