News

Energy stocks were lower late Wednesday afternoon, with the NYSE Energy Sector Index shedding 0.7% and the Energy Select Sector SPDR Fund (XLE) decreasing 0.3%.

The Philadelphia Oil Service Sector index was posting a 0.6% drop, while the Dow Jones US Utilities index rose 0.3%.

US crude-oil stocks, including those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, rose by 4.9 million barrels in the week ended Feb. 23 following an increase of 4.3 million barrels in the previous week. Excluding SPR inventories, commercial crude oil stocks rose by 4.2 million barrels after a 3.5-million-barrel gain in the previous week, a larger gain than the 3.7-million-barrel increase expected in a survey compiled by Bloomberg.

Front-month West Texas Intermediate crude was declining 0.6% to $78.39 a barrel, while global benchmark Brent was down 0.2% to $83.46 a barrel. Henry Hub natural gas futures jumped 4.1% to $1.88 per 1 million BTU.

In corporate news, Ecopetrol (EC) said Wednesday a UK court signed off on a restructuring plan for CB&I UK, a subsidiary of McDermott International, which includes discharging an arbitration award to Ecopetrol's Colombian subsidiary Refineria de Cartagena. Ecopetrol shares were falling 1.8%.

LanzaTech Global (LNZA) shares tumbled 8.6% following its Q4 results and plans to reorganize to cut costs as the company doesn't expect to achieve positive adjusted EBITDA by the end of 2024.

BWX Technologies (BWXT) jumped more than 13% following the company's Q4 earnings report late Tuesday.

Exxon Mobil (XOM) rose 0.2% after the company said it may exercise pre-emption rights over Hess' (HES) 30% stake in an oil block off Guyana.

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