Fueling Strategy: Please fill as needed tonight, Friday AM wholesale prices will drop another penny – Be Safe Today!

NYMEX Crude $ 50.11 UP $.9800
NY Harbor ULSD $1.5206 UP $.0158
NYMEX Gasoline $1.6035 UP $.0153

NEWS
Oil futures settled at their highest level in two weeks on Thursday, with U.S. prices reclaiming $50 a barrel as voters went to the polls in a landmark British referendum to determine whether the U.K. remains a member of the European Union.

Investors are wagering that support for the U.K. to stay in the 28-nation bloc has gained traction, stoking appetite for assets perceived as risky, including oil futures. Oil prices also got an added boost late in the trading session from reports of a fresh pipeline attack in Nigeria. The attack “dashed hopes that a cease-fire will hold,” said Phil Flynn, senior market analyst at Price Futures Group. Nigerian oil production has been near multi-decade lows and a resumption of attacks make it difficult to believe that it will get better soon,” he said.

August West Texas Intermediate crude rose 98 cents, or 2%, to settle at $50.11 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. August Brent crude on London’s ICE Futures exchange rose $1.03, or 2.1%, to $50.91 a barrel. Both WTI and Brent marked their highest futures settlements since June 9.

U.S. and European stock markets and oil prices found support after an Ipsos Mori poll showed the “remain” camp moving ahead in the Brexit debate. However, polls earlier this week have showed more Brits prefer to leave the EU. The markets “largely stopped betting that an agreement to leave the EU would be reached following the death of British MP Jo Cox last week,” Troy Vincent, oil analyst at ClipperData told MarketWatch. “This decline in risk has been reflected over the past week in various different forms of safe havens,” including Monday’s opening gap lower for the U.S. Dollar Index and gold prices trading lower despite the weaker dollar, he said.

“However, if the most likely scenario plays out with the U.K. remaining in the EU, and you couple this with recent [U.S.] Federal Reserve remarks on a slower pace of [interest-]rate hikes, we should expect the dollar to continue to sell off,” he said. That “may give WTI the push it needs to approach the next major resistance level at $54.”

On the other hand, if the U.K. votes to leave the EU, the U.S. dollar “should rally significantly, which would likely be a catalyst for a correction lower in crude prices,” said Vincent. Results from different constituencies will trickle in after midnight local time, or 7 p.m. Eastern Time, and the final outcome of the referendum will be announced early Friday. Focus on the Brexit has temporarily diluted the effect of a disappointing reduction in the U.S. crude stockpiles last week. Oil prices ended Thursday above $50 despite energy fundamentals being “less bullish” for weeks, Tyler Richey, co-editor of The 7:00’s Report, told MarketWatch. “The pace of U.S. production declines has slowed while rig counts have been seen rising, which suggests output declines in the lower 48 [states] will slow further or even begin to climb again in the coming weeks or months.”

Data from the Energy Information Administration showed U.S. crude inventories only decreased by 900,000 barrels last week—far less than the 5.2-million-barrel drawdown tipped by industry group American Petroleum Institute. The EIA also reported an unexpected weekly rise in domestic gasoline inventories.