Crude oil prices moving around Thursday's close as U.S. President Trump talks of U.S. economic strength, while fourth quarter GDP slips. File photo by Brian Kersey/UPI. |
License Photo
Jan. 26 (UPI) -- With the U.S. president touting his nation's economy, crude oil prices wavered around even amid a weaker GDP and new support Friday for the greenback.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, President Donald Trump, the first sitting U.S. president to address the forum in more than a decade, talked up the strength of the world's leading economy, pointing to new wealth generation, increased business confidence and a stock market that continues to set records.
"I am here to deliver a simple message: There has never been a better time to hire, to build, to invest and to grow in the United States," he said from the podium. "America is open for business and we are competitive once again."
Trade, however, may be an issue for the former real estate mogul as he tries to renegotiate the decades-old North American Free Trade Agreement. This week, the president signed a measure that imposed a stiff duty on imported solar power components.
His comments came the same day as the federal government issued its first estimate of growth in gross domestic product for the fourth quarter. The Commerce Department reported Friday that fourth quarter GDP grew at an annual rate of 2.6 percent, against 3.2 percent for the third quarter.
For the year, GDP increased 2.3 percent, an improvement from the 1.5 percent achieved in 2016, but below Trump's target of 3 percent.
The price for Brent crude oil was down 0.4 percent to $70.14 per barrel as of 9:12 a.m. EST, shortly after Trump's speech. West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. benchmark for the price of oil, was down 0.06 percent to $65.47 per barrel.
Prices earlier this week were supported by the steep drop in the value of the U.S. dollar that followed comments from Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin that a weak dollar was good for the United States. There's an inverse relationship usually between the strength of the U.S. dollar and commodity prices, though commodity experts at UBS said there were other factors like a narrowing gap between oil supply and demand and geopolitical risk that were also supporting the price of oil.
Speaking Friday to CNBC, Mnuchin tried to walk back his comments on the dollar, which were seen as breaking from traditional support for a strong greenback.
"Had the news printed my entire transcript the first time as opposed to just taking out one little point and kind of imply that I was trying to talk down the dollar, which I wasn't doing," he was quoted as saying.
