On Monday morning, oil prices continued to rise, despite a slight downward correction in last Friday's trading. In general, the oil market rose by about 4% last week, and analysts are confident that this is only the beginning of the rally of «black gold». The current price of Brent oil is $85.88 per barrel. North American WTI crude is trading at $81.12. The main drivers of growth were reports of a decrease in oil reserves in the United States for the first time in seven weeks, as well as geopolitical instability in the Middle East, drone attacks on Russian refineries and continued restrictions on oil production by OPEC+ countries. In addition, the International Energy Agency raised its forecast for oil demand for 2024 by 200 thousand barrels per day, to 103.2 million b/d. This led to a revision of expectations regarding the balance of supply and demand in the global oil market: instead of the previously predicted small surplus, a deficit of about 300 thousand b/d is now expected, subject to continued current production restrictions from OPEC+.
