Investing.com - Crude oil prices gained in Asia on Monday on by fresh drilling-activity declines in the U.S. last week and an apparent weekend purge of some in the Saudi royal family, including billionaire investor al-Waleed.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures rose 0.31% to $55.81 a barrel, while Brent crude futures, the benchmark for oil prices outside the U.S., gained 0.30% to $62.26 a barrel, taking both to levels not seen since July 2015.
In weekend news, Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin AbdelAziz, announced the formation of a ‘supreme committee chaired by Crown Prince (Mohammed bin Salman) and Chairman of the Monitoring and Investigation Commission, Chairman of the National Anti-Corruption Authority, Chief of the General Audit Bureau, Attorney General and Head of State Security’.
The move includes the reported detainment Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, whose Kingdom Holdings dropped 10% in trading on the Tadawul stock exchange on Sunday.
The White House statement said Sunday that Trump and Salman held a phone call discussing counter terrorism efforts, "the continuing threat of Iranian-backed Houthi militias in Yemen" and Saudi Arabia's interception of a missile fired from Yemen at its capital, Riyadh but the white house said nothing about whether the arrests were discussed.
Trump said he expects to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin when the two world leaders cross paths in Southeast Asia. Trump said pressure on North Korea was the priority during his first official visit to the region.
In the week ahead, investors will continue to monitor the progress of the U.S. tax reform bill in what will be relatively quiet week for economic data. China is to release data on trade and inflation,
Last week, oil prices extended their recent rally on Friday to reach the highest level in more than two years amid expectations that major global producers will extend a deal to curb production beyond its current expiry date next March.
Prices received another boost as a sizable weekly drop in active U.S. oil rigs fed expectations for a slowdown in domestic crude output growth.
Oilfield services firm Baker Hughes reported that the number of active U.S. rigs drilling for oil fell by eight to 729 last week. That was the fourth weekly decline in five.
The weekly rig count is an important barometer for the drilling industry and serves as a proxy for domestic oil production.
Oil prices extended a rally which began in early October, largely driven by hopes that oil producing countries will agree to extend an output cut at their meeting at the end of this month.
Under the original terms of the deal, OPEC and 10 other non-OPEC countries led by Russia agreed to cut production by 1.8 million barrels a day (bpd) for six months. The agreement was extended in May of this year for a period of nine more months until March 2018 in a bid to reduce global oil inventories and support oil prices.
Discussions are continuing in the run-up to the Nov. 30 meeting, which oil ministers from OPEC and the participating non-OPEC countries will attend.