Commodities Wrap 12 October: WTI Rises 1.87 Percent as Gold Settles 0.6 Percent Lower
Crude extended its gains on Monday after the weekend’s attacks on Saudi Arabia, with WTI 1.87 percent above Friday’s settlement at 93.57 dollars a barrel by the 18:53 GMT reading. Brent rose 1.69 percent to 106.49 dollars, near a two-week high. Gold’s December contract settled 0.6 percent lower at 4,190.60 dollars an ounce as the dollar sat near a year-and-a-half high. Sugar’s 3.01 percent rise led the seventeen tracked contracts, and nine of the seventeen stood above Friday’s settlements at our reading.
Attacks on Saudi Arabia outweigh Russian diesel and a restoring Gulf
Reuters’ oil report had the Iran-aligned Houthis claiming Saturday’s strike on Riyadh’s international airport, which killed 13 people and wounded more than 300, with further attacks on Sunday, and two more tanker attacks reported over the weekend: one struck by a drone near Oman’s Sohar and another damaged transiting the Strait of Hormuz, on the UK Maritime Trade Operations’ account; the report had Brent at its highest since 29 September, and Goldman Sachs raised its December Brent forecast to 90 dollars a barrel from 85, putting the risk premium at just over 20 dollars. The supply news ran the other way: ICE gasoil fell 2.3 percent to 1,449 dollars a metric ton after US President Donald Trump said on Friday that Russia would immediately supply more than 300,000 metric tons of diesel to US and global markets, with more to come later; an analyst in the report said Moscow had separately allowed 500,000 tons out under a partial lifting of its diesel-export ban, a volume he sized at one day of US consumption. Trump also announced a Russia-Ukraine ceasefire on energy infrastructure, which Ukraine’s president accused Russia of violating on Monday. In the Gulf of Mexico, Shell, Chevron and BP were redeploying personnel after Hurricane Isaias’ Saturday landfall, with the Marine Minerals Administration’s Monday count showing 29.63 percent of Gulf oil production still shut, from nearly 72 percent at Friday’s count, as published in our Commodities Wrap of 9 October. OPEC Secretary General Haitham Al Ghais said on Monday the organisation now expects 2026 demand growth of 400,000 barrels a day, from 1.4 million at the start of the year, with the deferred demand expected to materialise in 2027.
Gold settles off a one-week high as markets price a December hike
The Reuters gold report had gold easing after touching its highest since 2 October earlier in the session, pressured by the firmer dollar and higher oil, with the spot price 0.6 percent lower at 4,169.10 dollars by its 17:45 GMT reading and the December settlement as in the lede. The US government and bond market were closed for the Columbus Day holiday, and the week’s tests come fast: the US consumer inflation report on Wednesday, producer prices and retail sales on Thursday, and remarks from Fed Chair Kevin Warsh, with CME’s FedWatch tool pricing a hold this month but an 87.7 percent probability of a hike by December, an environment, the report noted, in which investors favour yield-bearing assets over gold. On our panel, copper was the only metal to rise and silver’s fall was the deepest, while the agricultural rows leaned against the dollar: sugar led the whole complex, coffee and corn followed, and soybeans were the only agricultural fall.
Energy
| Contract | Level | Change |
|---|---|---|
| WTI Crude, NYMEX (Nov’26), dollars a barrel | $93.57 | +1.87% |
| Brent Crude, ICE (Dec’26), dollars a barrel | $106.49 | +1.69% |
| RBOB Gasoline, NYMEX (Nov’26), dollars a gallon | $3.293 | -0.07% |
| ULSD Heating Oil, NYMEX (Nov’26), dollars a gallon | $4.7162 | -0.47% |
| Natural Gas, NYMEX (Nov’26), dollars per mmBtu | $3.171 | -1.52% |
Levels as displayed in the price feed at 18:53 GMT on Monday 12 October 2026, ranked by change against Friday’s settlements as carried in the feed; quotes, not settlements.
Metals
| Contract | Level | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Copper, COMEX (Dec’26), dollars a pound | $6.7575 | +0.98% |
| Platinum, NYMEX (Jan’27), dollars an ounce | $1,693.10 | -0.01% |
| Gold, COMEX (Dec’26), dollars an ounce | $4,192.50 | -0.56% |
| Palladium, NYMEX (Dec’26), dollars an ounce | $1,143.50 | -0.60% |
| Silver, COMEX (Dec’26), dollars an ounce | $60.435 | -1.00% |
Same read and basis, ranked by change; copper the only rise, and gold’s own December settlement of 4,190.60 dollars is in the lede.
Agricultural commodities
| Contract | Level | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Sugar, ICE (Mar’27), cents a pound | 20.86 | +3.01% |
| Coffee, ICE (Dec’26), cents a pound | 289.90 | +1.03% |
| Corn, CBOT (Dec’26), cents a bushel | 483.50 | +0.78% |
| Wheat, CBOT (Dec’26), cents a bushel | 672.75 | +0.26% |
| Soybeans, CBOT (Nov’26), cents a bushel | 1,288.25 | -0.29% |
Same read and basis, five of the seven tracked rows, with cotton 0.06 percent higher and cocoa 0.02 higher omitted in the middle; the agriculture figures were unchanged between our three reads.
Interest, currencies, volatility and crypto
| Instrument | Level | Change |
|---|---|---|
| VIX | 15.32 | +3.23% |
| US Dollar Index (DXY) | 102.59 | +0.37% |
| Dollar/Yen | 158.68 | +0.23% |
| Sterling/Dollar | 1.3201 | -0.23% |
| Euro/Dollar | 1.1155 | -0.41% |
| Bitcoin | $82,285.16 | -1.59% |
Reference rows at the same read, ranked by change; intraday levels, with the bitcoin row the Coin Metrics dollar price as the feed carries it.
Why it matters: Crude and gold split on Monday, and the split names the force that owns each contract: the barrel is pricing the attacks on Saudi soil and the strait its cargo ships through, while the metals are pricing the dollar and Wednesday’s US inflation print. OPEC’s demand-growth cut reads the same way: the premium in crude is a supply-at-risk price, not a consumption signal. The softs rising into a firmer dollar is the season’s own story, led by sugar. Europe’s banks-and-energy session rose on the same premium that Asia’s chip-led markets sold, as published in our Europe and Asia wraps earlier on Monday.
Outlook: Our US wrap follows after the New York close, reading a session with equities trading while SIFMA’s recommended Columbus Day holiday keeps the bond market closed, and it carries these four tables onward. OPEC’s Monthly Oil Market Report lands on Tuesday and the IEA’s on Wednesday, with the IMF’s World Economic Outlook due the same Tuesday at the Bangkok Annual Meetings and the US consumer inflation report on Wednesday, as published in our Week Ahead of 11 to 17 October.
How these wraps are prepared: Methodology.
Sources: CNBC, Reuters, The Edge.
