Oil slips as little impact seen from EU sanctions on Russia
Oil prices settled slightly lower on Monday as the latest European sanctions on Russian oil were expected to have minimal impact on supplies, but losses were curbed by investors weighing a potential drop in diesel supplies.
Brent crude futures settled down 7 cents, or 0.1%, to $69.21 a barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude settled down 14 cents, or 0.2%, to $67.20.
The European Union approved on Friday the 18th package of sanctions against Russia over its war in Ukraine, which also targeted India's Nayara Energy, an exporter of oil products refined from Russian crude.
"The market right now thinks that supply will still make it to market in one way, shape or another. There is not too much concern," said John Kilduff, a partner at Again Capital in New York.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that Russia had built up a certain immunity to Western sanctions.
The EU sanctions followed U.S. President Donald Trump's threats last week to impose sanctions on buyers of Russian exports unless Russia agrees to a peace deal within 50 days.
ING analysts said the part of the package likely to have an effect is the EU import ban on refined products processed from Russian oil in third countries, though ING said that could prove difficult to monitor and enforce.
Curbing some of crude's losses during afternoon trade on Monday were investor concerns around diesel supplies resulting from the sanctions package, analysts said.
Source: Reuters
