First 2025 Weekly Loss For Oil As Trump Pressures OPEC To Drop Prices

The move is intended to force Russia to end its war in Ukraine: File Image/Pixabay

Donald Trump-obsessed oil traders on Friday propelled the commodity to its first weekly loss of the New Year, although the daily settlement was mildly positive as the U.S. president called on the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) to lower its prices.

Brent settled up 21 cents to $78.50 per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate settled up 4 cents to $74.66; for the week, Brent lost 2.8 percent, while WTI shed 4.1 percent, the first such losses in five weeks.

Trump's call on OPEC was intended to hurt Russia economically and bring about an end to the war in Ukraine, and Alex Hodes, analyst at StoneX, seemed to appreciate his strategy, pointing out that pressuring the cartel would also "cover the void" caused by Trump's threat to impose harsh sanctions on Russia and Iran – which otherwise could undermine his goal of lowering energy costs.

For the record, Russian president Vladimir Putin reiterated that he's open to discussing Ukraine and oil prices with Trump.

Hodes went on to observe that Trump's ties with Saudi Arabia would allow for him to "have a hand in OPEC+ and encourage the group to crack into" its 5.5 million barrels per day (bpd) of reserve production capacity, in order to lower prices to his liking.

But Giovanni Staunovo, commodities analyst at UBS, said, "I don't really expect OPEC will change policy unless there is a change in fundamentals….markets will be relatively muted until we get more clarity on sanctions policy and tariffs."

Manish Raj, managing director at Velandera Energy Partners, agreed, pointing out that the brash billionaire will need to choose between two conflicting goals - a lower oil price or higher domestic crude volume - because "he can't have both."

In other oil news on Friday, Pankaj Jain, oil secretary for India, told media that his country received clarification from the U.S. that the Russian oil tankers sanctioned earlier this month were allowed to discharge their crude at Indian ports until February 27; at least 4.4 million barrels of crude from Russia are currently being shipped to India, according to data compiled by Bloomberg and Kpler.

Also, S&P Global Commodity Insights reported that the world's biggest crude exporter, Saudi Aramco, this week bought its first cargo of U.S. WTI Midland, in the Platts window from commodity trader Gunvor.

Adi Imsirovic, director at consultant Surrey Clean Energy, said, "Aramco has clearly made a decision to get more involved in trading - we will see more and more of this."