Commodities round-up: Oil retreats from recent highs on backdated Opec figures

The oil market rally fuelled by Opec's recent decision to cut its output came to an abrupt end on Tuesday (6 December) after survey figures revealed the cartel's output for November came in at a record high.

According to data compiled by Reuters and Bloomberg, higher production in Nigeria, Libya and Angola, Opec's production rose to 34.16m barrels per day (bpd) last month. Following the conclusion of its ministers' meeting in Vienna, Austria on 30 November, Opec introduced its first real-terms output cut in eight years, of 1.2m bpd to 32.5m bpd, which would take effect from January 2017.

At 3:18pm BST, the Brent front month futures contract was down 2.37% or $1.30 to $53.64 per barrel, while the West Texas Intermediate was 2.65% or $1.37 lower at $50.42 per barrel.

Opec also said its output cut will be supported by non-Opec producers to the tune of a 600,000 bpd reduction, of which the Russian federation will account for 300,000 bpd. Crunch talks with Russia and other non-Opec producers are scheduled for later this month with a view to providing more details.

Analysts at Vienna-based JBC Energy said: "Prices have retreated slightly on the market data. Now coming into focus is an Opec, non-Opec meeting in Vienna on Saturday, targeting an agreement to cut a further 600,000 bpd cut. We are inclined to think this kind of volume is unlikely."

Away from the oil market, precious metals remained in negative territory despite volatility in the currency market following a defeat for Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in the country's constitutional referendum triggering his resignation.

However, as the dollar strengthened, Comex gold futures contract was down 0.24% or $2.80 at 3:24pm BST to $1,173.70 an ounce, while Comex silver fell 0.10% or 2 cents to $16.89 an ounce.

FXTM research analyst Lukman Otunuga said the ever-rising expectations of the US Federal Reserve raising rates in December have left gold extremely vulnerable to losses with the metal hovering around 10-month lows.

"This zero-yielding metal has received a beating this year with the painful combination of mounting rate hike expectations, dollar resurgence and revival of investor risk appetite encouraging bears to install heavy rounds of selling. With prices repeatedly creating lower lows and lower highs on the daily time-frame, the metal can be considered bearish. Previous resistance around $1,190 could transform into a dynamic resistance that sparks a steeper selloff towards $1150."

Elsewhere, for a second successive session, spot platinum bucked the wider precious metals market trend registering a rise of 1.14% or $13.26 to $950.76 an ounce, on higher industrial demand.