Oil and natural gas prices climbed Monday, while wheat prices briefly spiked higher, as investors reacted to the weekend’s brief and chaotic insurrection in Russia.
Markets were largely focused on whether the turmoil in Moscow could disrupt global commodity supplies. Russia is the world’s second biggest exporter of oil, and the world’s biggest exporter of wheat.
US crude oil futures briefly climbed 1.3%, before trading up 0.8% by 12.15 p.m. ET. Brent crude, the international benchmark, gained 0.7%. Both contracts lost nearly 4% last week.
“Given that the short-lived event this weekend in Russia appears to have ended, we do not expect to see such a significant increase in oil prices,” analysts at Rystad Energy wrote in a note.
“We do, however, believe that the geopolitical risk amid internal instability in Russia has increased. As such, we are likely to see a marginal uptick in oil prices in the coming days if the situation does not deteriorate further.”
Benchmark prices for European natural gas were up 10% from Friday’s close to trade at €36 ($39) per megawatt hour. Prices have shot up over the past few weeks, mostly because of outages at some Norwegian gas plants. News that a Dutch gas field will close permanently in October has also boosted prices.
Russia’s gas exports to Europe have fallen sharply since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, but it still supplied 15% of EU demand last year.
