Oil Failing at the 200 Daily SMA Again After Inventories Drawdown

Crude Oil has been on a bearish trend in the longer term charts, with moving averages acting as resistance at the top, but we have seen a decent bullish retrace since the beginning of July. Although buyers failed to push Oil above the 200 SMA (purple) which rejected the price for a second time, after it had done so earlier in April. Yesterday, the price of Oil touched the falling 200-day moving average, which came at $76.87, but it remained well below that level.

Last week, the price tested the 200-day moving average on both Thursday and Friday before reversing its direction and moving downward, so it seems like this moving average has turned into strong resistance for WTI Crude Oil. Yesterday the EIA crude Oil inventories were released, showing a drawdown, although this was smaller than expected. As we said above, crude Oil jumped higher but stopped right at the 200 SMA, which rejected the price again, so we are looking to sell crude Oil below this moving average.