Crude oil and refined product futures were again lower near midday Tuesday as equity and commodity markets pulled back ahead as the Federal Reserve began a two-day meeting.

Fed officials are expected to make no change to their benchmark federal-funds rate.

The NYMEX June West Texas Intermediate contract was down by 95cts to $81.68/bbl at about 11 a.m. ET and the July WTI contract was 97cts lower at $81.06/bbl.

Trading in the Brent June contract, which will expire at the end of trading Tuesday, was off by 56cts to $87.84/bbl. The more-active July contract was 90cts lower at $86.30/bbl.

Declines in refined product futures outpaced those for crude. The NYMEX June RBOB contract was down 4.29cts to $2.688/gal while the lightly-traded May contract was 4.2cts lower at $2.7067/gal in its final day in the front-month position. The May ULSD contract, which also was seeing light trading, was off by 3.3cts to $2.4983/gal and the June contract was down 2.3cts to $2.523/gal.

Gasoline and diesel contracts are on track for declines of about 6cts/gal so far this week and that will likely support gross rack-to-retail margins for both in the coming days.

The U.S. average national retail margin for gasoline was 32.8cts/gal on Tuesday, 11.2cts lower than a week earlier, according to OPIS MarginPro data.

Diesel margins have fared better, after ending last week relatively flat. U.S. margins on Tuesday averaged 64cts/gal, down 2cts week to week, the data showed.

Tuesday's futures decline were reflected in spot gasoline and diesel markets.

While East of the Rockies markets were seeing gasoline prices move roughly in sync with futures, Group 3 gasoline losses were about 1.5cts/gal deeper, with prices off by about 6cts/gal. On the West Coast, Los Angeles CARBOB was down by about 6.7cts/gal and Pacific Northwest prices were more than 10cts/gal lower.

Ethanol-related D6 and biomass-based diesel D4 Renewable Identification Number credit prices were on track for a fifth day of declines, with both D6 and D4 RINs off by 2cts heading into the afternoon.

This content was created by Oil Price Information Service, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. OPIS is run independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

--Reporting by Steve Cronin, scronin@opisnet.com; Editing by Jeff Barber, jbarber@opisnet.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

04-30-24 1214ET