Investing.com – Oil prices rose on Thursday amid plunging exports by Venezuela, a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
Crude Oil WTI Futures for July delivery were trading at $65.03 a barrel at 12:10PM ET (04:10 GMT), up 0.46%. Brent Oil Futures for August delivery, traded in London, were also up 0.48% at $75.72 per barrel.
Meanwhile, Shanghai Crude Oil WTI Futures for September delivery were up 0.7% at 464 yuan per barrel on Thursday.
Venezuela is almost a month behind in shipping crude oil to customers from its main oil export port, reports on Thursday said.
"OPEC supply changes remain the biggest uncertainties in the market," said Xi Jianrui, senior crude analyst with oil consultancy JLC.
Elsewhere, inventories of U.S. crude rose by 2.072 million barrels for the week ended June 1, confounding expectations for a draw of 2.000 million barrels, according to data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA).
Sentiment on oil prices remained mostly negative, as investors continued to fear OPEC, at its meeting on June 22, could ease production curbs to offset falling supplies in Venezuela and an expected drop in Iran oil exports as U.S. sanctions loom.
In November 2016, OPEC and other producers, including Russia agreed to cut output by 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd) to slash global inventories to the five year-average. The OPEC-led deal was renewed last year through 2018.
OPEC-member Iraq said on Wednesday that a production increase was not on the table as the market was stable and prices were good, despite reports that the U.S. government had asked Saudi Arabia and other OPEC members to increase oil output by around 1 million.