Oil volatility ( ^OVX ) has leveled out as geopolitical concerns in the Middle East fade. Yahoo Finance anchor Julie Hyman takes a closer look at the recent oil price ( CL=F , BZ=F ) action and the moves in the broader energy sector ( XLE ).
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Crude prices have seen big swings in recent weeks amid geopolitical uncertainty. We're taking a closer look at the action in our chart of the day. Yahoo Finance's Julie Hyman joining us now with more. Julie.
Well, energy volatility is what I am watching here. You know that there is a volatility measure for the S&P 500. You might not know that there is one for oil prices as well. It's called the OVX as opposed to the VIX for stocks. And the OVX, as you might imagine, given all the volatility we've seen in oil recently, really spiked to highs that we have not seen since early 2022 as we saw Israel hit Iran, Iran hit Israel, and then the US of course hit Iranian nuclear assets. So, all of that causing that huge spike in oil volatility on concerns that we would see flows disrupted. But it is just as quickly calmed down. That spike was very short-lived as we saw it spike and then really recede here. Couple of things that oil traders are now watching. There is an OPEC Plus meeting that is coming up in a couple of weeks, a little less than two weeks. And there are some reports now that OPEC Plus may extend its production cuts. So that putting some downward pressure on oil prices. Also, Bloomberg is reporting that Treasury Secretary Scott Beson said that sanctions on Iran are remaining in place. So that's something else that oil traders are factoring in. But really we saw oil really lose about $10 per barrel of value if you're talking about WTI while all this was going down and we were seeing it come back down. WTI is off about 9%, almost 8, 9% so far this year, whereas the ETF that tracks those energy stocks, the XLE, is really little changed. And I looked at it earlier today, it's almost evenly split between gains and losses in terms of the stocks that are up and the stocks that are down on the year. The best performer in that ETF EQT, which is more of a natural gas company as opposed to oil. Halliburton, the oil services giant, is the worst performer within that ETF, Josh.
All right, thank you, Julie.