Big Oil lent its weight to an upside bounce on the FTSE 350 from the downdraft registered during the previous week.
Helping stocks in the sector along was a 2.0% advance for front-dated Brent crude oil futures to $81.99 a barrel on the ICE following the release of bullish inventory data the day before.
According to the Energy Information Administration, the US Department of Energy’s statistical arm, commercial crude oil inventories in the US shrank by 5.9m barrels (consensus: -3.0m barrels) over the week ending on 16 December.
There was also some positive market chatter in the background with S&P Global vice chairman, Dan Yergin, telling CNBC that “if you go back to your China story, China comes roaring back, underinvestment in oil and gas, we get up to like $121”.
Top performing sectors so far today
Household Goods & Home Construction 10,062.40 +3.01%
Life Insurance 6,986.16 +2.86%
Industrial Metals & Mining 7,878.17 +2.63%
Oil, Gas and Coal 8,217.25 +2.27%
Leisure Goods 21,487.31 +2.26%
Bottom performing sectors so far today
Automobiles & Parts 1,465.75 -2.96%
