Brent crude dropped by 2.1% to $59.39 a barrel as rising numbers of deaths from the Coronavirus sparked fears of a drop in demand for oil.
West Texas Intermediate also fell, down 2.3% to $52.94, as it emerged that the death toll had risen to 80 people.
Saudi Arabia’s Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman Al-Saud sought to calm markets which he said was “primarily driven by psychological factors and extremely negative expectations adopted by some market participants despite its very limited impact on global oil demand”.
He said, “Such extreme pessimism occurred back in 2003 during the SARS outbreak though it did not cause a significant reduction in oil demand.”
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