Oil Relatively Cheaper In Europe Than In The U.S

The price of oil is on the rise. One barrel of WTI Crude Oil (Western Texas Intermediate, a benchmark from the United States) now costs more than 64 U.S. dollars, a price last reached in 2014 when the price reached a height of 100 U.S. dollars. Crude Oil Brent (the European benchmark) reached almost 70 U.S. dollars. Several reasons for this price increase include the production limitation of the OPEC countries, the IPO of Saudi Aramco (the largest oil company in the world), and the decrease of United States oil reserves together with modest production increases from Russia, Nigeria, Venezuela, Iraq and Iran.

In the meantime, the euro also surged to new heights in 2017 and has continued to do so. On Friday January 12th, 2018, the EUR/USD exchange rate reached a value of 1.2155, the highest in more than three years. The continued rise of the euro in 2017 compensated for the increasing oil price and made one barrel of crude oil relatively cheaper when buying in euros instead of in U.S. dollars.