Oil futures had a small gain in Friday’s session, despite another rise in US oil rig numbers for the 15th week in a row.
June West Texas Intermediate futures crude rose 36 cents, or 0.7%, to settle $US49.33 a barrel in New York.
Prices were down about 2.5% over the month for the front-month May contract.
Oil services group, Baker Hughes on Friday reported that the number of active US rigs drilling for oil rose by nine to 697 last week. That saw the total active US rig count, which includes oil and natural-gas rigs climb by 13 to 870.
This increase was ignored on Friday, as was another 13,000 barrels a day rise in US production to 9.265 million barrels a day, up 327,000 barrels a day.
US oil stocks fell for a third week to 528.7 million barrels, still very high historically.
And Iran has signalled its willingness to back Saudi Arabia’s push to raise oil prices by saying it is willing to cap its oil output until the end of the year.
Despite wanting to boost output, Petroleum Minister Bijan Zanganeh told Reuters on Saturday that Iran has kept its oil production at 3.8 million barrels a day under an agreement brokered last year by the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and joined by some critical non-OPEC members including Russia.
Saudi Arabia has told OPEC officials that it wants to extend the cartel’s agreement to cut crude-oil production for another six months when the group meets on May 25 in Vienna.
OPEC member Iran, which was allowed to limit rather than reduce its output under the November, 2016 deal, was seen as a potential obstacle. But apparently no longer.
Comex gold futures in New York also rose on Friday, ensuring a monthly gain of more than 1%. Prices, however, still registered a loss for the week
June gold rose $US2.40, or 0.2%, to settle at $US1,268.30 an ounce.
The June gold futures contract rose about 1.4% for the month despite the 1.6% weekly loss.
Comex July silver futures fell 7.2 cents, or 0.4%, to $17.262 an ounce on Friday, with the contract losing 5.4% for the month.
And Comex July copper futures rose 0.6% to $US2.608 a pound. For the week it was up nearly 7 cents a pound, but for the month, it was down 1.7%.
