Oil prices slip as economic worries offset tightening supplies

SINGAPORE: Crude futures slipped on Monday as concerns over slowing global growth outweighed the prospect of tightening supply after talks among key producers to raise output in coming months stalled.
Brent crude for September fell 15 cents, or 0.2 percent, to $75.40 a barrel by 0411 GMT while US West Texas Intermediate crude for August was at $74.44 a barrel, down 12 cents, or 0.2 percent.
The spread of coronavirus variants and unequal access to vaccines threaten the global economic recovery, finance chiefs of the G20 large economies warned on Saturday.
A Reuters tally of new COVID-19 infections shows them rising in 69 countries, with the daily rate pointing upwards since late-June and now hitting 478,000.
“We’ve not yet seen the impact but at this rate, it will hit demand sooner or later,” a Singapore-based oil trader said.
Oil prices slumped last Tuesday after the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and their allies, a group known as OPEC+, did not reach an agreement to increase output from August. This was because the United Arab Emirates rejected a proposed eight-month extension to OPEC+ output curbs.
“Prices are going to stay volatile for as long as the impasse remains,” said Howie Lee, an economist at Singapore’s OCBC bank.