LiveWire

''Oil prices rose for the third straight session on Friday, and is on track for a fifth straight weekly gain, as falling inventories and demand recovery hopes outweighed news that OPEC+ is planning a further gradual increase of oil output from August. The EIA Petroleum Status Report showed US crude oil inventories fell by more than expected 7.61 million barrels in the week of June 18th, a fifth consecutive period of decline and the largest since the last week of April. The oil market is up around 50% so far this year, as investors are upbeat about fuel demand recovery this summer, with vaccination programs in Europe and the US allowing more people to travel. In addition, talks between world powers and Iran to revive a nuclear deal ended without an agreement. At around 06:15 AM GMT, WTI crude rose 0.3% to $73.43 a barrel, while Brent oil was up 0.2% to $75.72 a barrel. Both benchmark contracts settled at their highest levels since October 2018 on Thursday.''

Stockpiles fell on global demand recovery, adding to the bullish sentiment driving up the barrel price to $73. Chinese crude oil inventories are also falling.

MCD will be rolling out a loyalty program nationally next month, the latest restaurant chain to invest in rewards for repeat customers. The program will be introduced on July 8th, after the fast-food giant tested it in some US markets. Users receive points on qualifying purchases that can be traded for items like hash browns, McNuggets, and more. Companies also are increasingly gravitating toward loyalty programs to gain access to more first-party data in the wake of Google and Apple Inc.’s moves allowing people to opt out of tracking.

Lithium surged 91.40% YTD because of a ramp up in EV demand. Coal rose 46.80% this year in what is dubbed a surprising turn of events. China takes center stage as a net exporter. Crude oil climbed 47.53% thus far, making the quickest recovery of all commodities despite oil demand remaining 5% lower than same time in 2019. Natural gas, especially LNG, has seen prices cooled off due to seasonality and weather disruptions, but YTD saw a price rise of 25.17%. Ethanol, the sugar, and plant-based energy is seeing some tailwinds and is up 71.67%.

Torchlight is a tiny oil company that saw its shares pop from a Reddit-led short squeeze effort. The Plano, Texas-based company jumped as much as 74% to $10.88 a share on Monday before paring some gains. Torchlight, which has a market capitalization of about $1.2 billion, is the second-biggest gainer on the Nasdaq this year. At the end of the first quarter, its market value was about $266 million.