Thus, on the London ICE Futures stock exchange, the price of the February futures of the North Sea oil mixture Brent fell by 0.1% to $ 48.2 per barrel. As a result of trading on Wednesday, these contracts rose by 1.8% to $ 48.25 per barrel.

The price of January futures for WTI crude oil in electronic trading on the New York Stock Exchange NYMEX fell by 0.40% to $ 45.10 per barrel. On Wednesday, futures fell 1.6% to $ 45.28 per barrel.

All the attention of market participants is focused on the OPEC+ meeting, scheduled towards the end of the day. The main question of the meeting is whether to increase oil production from the beginning of 2021 against the background of falling demand in the context of the coronavirus pandemic.

Recall that since May of this year, OPEC+ has reduced the production of black gold by 7.7 million barrels per day. Further, production was forecast to decline by 5.8 million barrels per day from January 2021 to the end of April 2022.

However, the alliance decided not to rush to a final decision. The reason for this indecision was the November increase in oil prices, associated with the hope of the imminent appearance of COVID-19 vaccines. The prospect of ridding the world of the coronavirus pandemic still remains a reason for some participants in the international organization to doubt the need to extend the current reduction. If such a decision is not made, the world is likely to face an active decline in oil prices. Widespread lockdowns and the uncontrolled growth of COVID-19 diseases are already causing significant blows to energy demand.

A day earlier, the oil market was supported by news about the decline in oil reserves in the United States and information about the approval of the anti-cancer vaccine by Pfizer and BioNTech in the UK.

On Wednesday, the US Department of Energy said that commercial reserves of black gold in the country last week decreased by 679,000 barrels, while gasoline and distillates, on the contrary, increased.

Meanwhile, the leader of the Democratic Party in the US House of Representatives, Steny Hoyer, said that he hopes to reach a consensus on the issue of new budget incentives this weekend.

The day before, a bipartisan group had tabled a new stimulus package worth more than $900 billion. A day later, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic minority leader Chuck Schumer said they were considering the proposal as a basis for further negotiations.