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Brent crude futures were up 53 cents, or 0.65%, to $82.57 a
barrel at 0922 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude
futures rose 64 cents, or 0.82%, to $78.79 a barrel, after
declining the past two days.
China's 2024 economic growth target of around 5% set on Tuesday
lacked big-ticket stimulus plans to bolster its struggling
economy, raising concerns of sluggish oil demand growth.
The market "specifically was hoping to see further fiscal
expansion to help meet the growth target," said Tony Sycamore,
an analyst at IG in Sydney.
Eyes are now on U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell's
semi-annual monetary policy testimony to Congress on Wednesday
and Thursday and Friday's U.S. employment data, Sycamore said.
Friday's U.S. non-farm payrolls data is expected to show an
increase of 200,000 jobs in February after surging 353,000 in
January, according to a Reuters survey of economists.
Powell's comments and the jobs data could provide clearer
direction on U.S. interest rates, and signs of a Fed cut would
be seen as positive for the economy and oil demand.
Oil prices were lifted by the announcement on Sunday that the
Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies
(OPEC+) extended output cuts of 2.2 million barrels per day
until the end of the second quarter.
The extension has created some supply tightness, particularly in
Asian markets, along with the disruption in oil tanker movements
as a result of the Red Sea attacks by the Houthi militia in
Yemen that is tying up barrels in transit.
That physical tightness was apparent as Saudi Arabia, the
world's biggest oil exporter, announced on Wednesday slightly
higher prices for April crude sales to Asia, its biggest market.
The first of this week's two U.S. inventory reports, from the
American Petroleum Institute industry group, showed U.S. crude
stocks rose by 423,00 barrels in the week ended March 1, market
sources said, much smaller than the increase of 2.1 million
barrels, expected by analysts in a Reuters poll.
Official data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration is
due on Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. ET (1530 GMT).
(Reporting by Paul Carsten in London, Laura Sanicola in New York
and Andrew Hayley in Beijing; Editing by Christian Schmollinger
and Bernadette Baum)
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