Oil prices declined during trading on Thursday, October 30, following comments by US President Donald Trump about the meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.
Trump described the meeting as great and said many decisions were made, including reducing US tariffs on China by about 10% to 47%, and reducing fentanyl tariffs on China to 10% from 20%.
Regarding tariffs on rare earth metals, Trump confirmed that Beijing would continue exporting them, stressing that all issues related to them had been resolved.
Regarding interest rates, the Federal Reserve cut rates by 25 basis points on Wednesday, in line with expectations. Fed Chair Jerome Powell stated that current interest rates are slightly above the neutral average.
He added: Inflation is still negatively impacting citizens, and this will take some time to resolve. However, he emphasized that available indicators point to a moderate expansion in economic activity and a slowdown in job gains this year.
Separately, data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration showed that crude oil inventories fell by 6.86 million barrels to 416 million barrels in the week ending October 24, compared with analysts' expectations in a Reuters poll of a 211,000-barrel decline.
In trading, Brent crude futures fell by about 0.5% to $64.62 a barrel. US crude futures also declined by 0.5%, settling at $60.17 a barrel.
