Slow Hump Day For Energy Trading

The Department of Energy isn’t releasing their national petroleum status report today on account of Washington’s birthday we celebrated Monday, and will instead publish tomorrow at 10am Central Time. That, combined with the overall sleepy tone of this week, will likely lead to slow hump day for energy trading, as the complex floats slightly lower to start this morning.

The American crude oil benchmark hit a 3 month high yesterday, the rise being most recently attributed to optimism surrounding US-China trade talks currently underway. WTI futures are taking a break this morning, trading lower by about 50 cents per barrel, likely due to profit-taking from its rally that started last Monday.

Something that could spark at least some amount of action out of futures today is the release of the Federal Open Market Committee’s minutes from their January 30 meeting. Although severe weather has cancelled the press lockup for the data release, the FOMC will still publish their minutes today as investors look for more clarification on the Fed’s monetary for the year and how Committee will address inflation.

Even though refined product prices settled lower yesterday, and seem to be opting that same direction today, technicals still look like the futures are on the cusp of a sizeable break to the upside. RBOB and HO are both knocking on the door of their respective 100 day moving averages, testing their mettle against the resistance level, so far unsuccessfully, in an attempt to continue last week’s rally.

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