Crude Oil Futures: Diminishing bets for further downside

Considering advanced prints from CME Group for crude oil futures markets, open interest shrank for the second session in a row on Wednesday, now by around 16.6K contracts. Volume followed suit and dropped for the third consecutive day, this time by around 13.6K contracts.

WTI: Next on the downside comes $76.00

Prices of the WTI extended the corrective decline on Wednesday and seem en route to close the post-OPEC+ gap seen at the beginning of the month. The daily retracement, however, was in tandem with declining open interest and volume and is indicative that a deeper pullback is out of favour. The should be an initial support near the $76.00 mark per barrel (March 31 high).