Oil Prices Continue to Fall in Early Trade

The market has been closely following events in China, where authorities have confined Shanghai, a metropolis of 26 million people, to a "zero tolerance" policy for COVID-19. China is the world's largest importer of oil.

The International Energy Agency's (IEA) member states will release 60 million barrels over the next six months, with the US matching that amount as part of the 180 million barrel release announced in March.

The publication might also prevent producers, notably OPEC and US shale producers, from pursuing production increases even at prices around $100 a barrel, ANZ Research analysts said in a report.

However, the OPEC+ group of oil exporting countries has shown no sign of increasing its production objectives beyond the 400,000 barrels per day added monthly as part of the reinstatement of supply limits.

The IEA release would provide around 2 million barrels per day of supply for the next two months – plus an additional 1 million barrels per day from the United States for the next four months. It is unknown if this will compensate for the shortage of Russian oil after that country's invasion of Ukraine.

Russia's oil and gas condensate output declined to 10.52 million barrels per day (bpd) in April from an average of 11.01 million bpd in March.