- Oil lost nearly 6% yesterday to reach a seven-month low
- China extended lockdown measures have fueled concerns of falling appetite or demand for crude oil from the world's largest consuming nation
- ECB announced a 75-basis point rate hike at today's meeting, and the market will be eagerly watching remarks made by the ECB and Fed Chair Powell later today
- Meanwhile, The USD Index (DXY – a proxy for USD strength against a basket of other int’l currencies) reached its highest level since 2002
- A more expensive dollar can cause foreign buyers of dollar-denominated commodities to pay more for the same amount of goods
- The Chinese city of Chengdu extended lockdowns indefinitely in most of its downtown regions in an effort to curb new Covid cases
- The city of 21 million residents reported 116 new cases on Wednesday, up from 90 on Monday
- City officials announced that mass testing and restrictions, including the closure of non-essential businesses and schools, will continue
- OPEC+ may need to cut production deeper, said JP Morgan in a report, as oil prices have fallen further after the symbolic output decrease agreed on September 5 (BBG)
- "We believe further intervention may be necessary and suggest a cut of up to 1 MMBbl/d may be needed to stem the downward momentum in prices and realign physical and paper markets, which appear disconnected," wrote Christyan Malek, global head of energy strategy at JPM
- On Monday, OPEC+ agreed to reduce their output by 0.100 MMBbbl/d in October