North Sea Brent crude trades near $71 per barrel on Thursday

© ООО Региональные новости

Brent crude oil, extracted from the North Sea, traded on Thursday around $71 per barrel, marking a slight decline of 0.1%.

Since 2007, the benchmark Brent crude has been a blend of several grades produced at offshore fields such as Brent, Forties, Oseberg, and Ekofisk between the coasts of Norway and the UK.

The price difference between these Brent grades and Urals crude typically ranges from $8 to $15 per barrel.

Major trading platforms for oil include international commodity exchanges like NYMEX (WTI, USA) and ICE (Brent, Europe), as well as regional exchanges such as SPIMES (Urals, Russia) and SGX (Asia).

Trading takes place through futures and spot contracts linked to benchmark crude grades—American WTI, European Brent, and Asian Dubai/Oman—shaping the global pricing landscape.

This analysis was presented by Alexei Grishchenko, Doctor of Economics, Professor at the Department of Operational and Sectoral Management at the Higher School of Management, Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation.