Oil climbs as Hurricane Harvey intensifies

The US National Hurricane Center (NHC) announced on Friday that the hurricane Harvey has strengthened further, turning out to be potentially the biggest hurricane to hit the US mainland in more than ten years, with life-threatening floods expected along the Gulf Coast.

Reuters reports, the NHC further said in its advisory, “Hurricane Harvey grew into a category 2 storm with winds of 105 mph (169 kph) as it moved northwest about 220 miles (355 km) off Corpus Christi, Texas.”

Energy companies shut coastal refineries and halted onshore drilling in south Texas already on Thursday. Hence, both crude benchmarks remain underpinned so far this Friday amid potential supply disruption concerns, with WTI rising +0.72% to $ 47.77, while Brent advances +0.85% to $ 52.50.