Investing.com - Crude prices rallied for the second day in a row on Tuesday, as appetite for riskier assets improved after a speech by Chinese President Xi Jinping eased concerns about a trade conflict between the United States and China.
Speaking at the Boao Forum for Asia, Xi said that China would lower import tariffs on vehicles, encourage imports and strengthen the protection of intellectual property.
The remarks helped soothe investor jitters over the ongoing tit-for-tat tariff dispute between the U.S. and China, which investors had feared might escalate into a full-blown trade war between the world's two largest economies.
New York-traded West Texas Intermediate crude futures jumped 81 cents, or about 1.3%, to $64.22 a barrel by 4:00AM ET (0800GMT).
Meanwhile, Brent crude futures, the benchmark for oil prices outside the U.S., rose 88 cents, or roughly 1.3%, to $69.53 a barrel.
Both benchmarks reached their best levels since April 2 earlier in the session.
Oil prices scored a gain of more than 2% on Monday, recovering much of what they lost last week, when growing fears of a trade war between the U.S. and China dented morale.
Market players now looked ahead to fresh data on U.S. commercial crude inventories to gauge the strength of demand in the world’s largest oil consumer and how fast output levels will continue to rise.
Industry group the American Petroleum Institute is due to release its weekly report at 4:30PM ET (2030GMT) Tuesday. Official data from the Energy Information Administration will be released Wednesday, amid forecasts for an oil-stock gain of around 0.2 million barrels.
Analysts and traders have recently warned that booming U.S. shale oil production could potentially derail OPEC's effort to end a supply glut.
OPEC and other producers, including Russia, agreed to cut output by about 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd) in November last year to slash global inventories to the five year-average. The arrangement is set to expire at the end of 2018.
The market is also keeping an eye on developments out of Syria. U.S. President Donald Trump promised a "major response" within 24 to 48 hours to an alleged chemical attack in Syria, which he said could be the work of the Syrian government, Iran, Russia or all three.
In other energy trading, gasoline futures tacked on 1.1% to $2.001 a gallon, while heating oil gained 1.2% to $2.020 a gallon.
Natural gas futures inched up 0.2% to $2.698 per million British thermal units.