Brent oil trading lower on continued euro debt concerns

Brent crude oil prices are trading lower on Tuesday as European debt concerns continue to affect stock markets with Brent crude oil futures lower by 72 cents to $70.45 on the ICE Futures Exchange.

“Speculators are shifting money from risky to non-risky assets,” said Ken Hasegawa, a commodity derivatives sales manager at Newedge in Tokyo. “From a fundamental point of view, inventories are high so that could push prices further down but crude oil is really going to be driven by the euro issue.”

The “oil market sentiment is still depressed by the uncertain outlook for Europe,” the Commonwealth Bank of Australia said in a report.

“Markets are likely to struggle, as they always do, in deciding if the worst is over,” Singapore’s DBS Bank said in a market commentary.

“Those still bent on a break-up in the single market pointed to the takeover of a small Spanish savings bank, CajaSur, by its government as a sign that sovereign debt woes have now spread to banks in the eurozone.”