Hurricane Matthew churns toward the southern Caribbean Oil traded near a three-month high as investors look ahead to next month’s OPEC meeting and as Hurricane Matthew threatened to disrupt fuel shipments along the U.S. East Coast.
Futures fluctuated in New York after rising 9.3 percent the previous four sessions. Matthew is threatening to shut in about 33 million barrels of oil storage in the Bahamas and disrupt Caribbean shipping this week before heading northwest toward the U.S. East Coast. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries agreed to trim supply for the first time in eight years last week. Quotas will be decided at the group’s official meeting in Vienna on Nov. 30.
“The speculators are gunning for $50 dollars and will then head for $51.67, which was the wave high that we touched back in June,” said Bob Yawger, director of the futures division at Mizuho Securities USA Inc. in New York. “The OPEC meeting next month is on the horizon. I don’t think that we’re moving on fundamentals though.”