The price of the WTI crude oil futures are settling at $72.56. That is up $0.16 or 0.22%. The low for the day reached $70.50. The-high for the day reached $72.70.
Yesterday the price settled at $72.40. The initial move today was to the downside as China data led to expectations of slower growth and lower demand.
After bottoming near $72.50, the price started to rotate back to the upside. Finally in the most current hour, the price was able to extend into positive territory.
In the process, the process the price extended above the sideways 200 hour moving average at $72.37, and the sideways moving 100 hour moving average is $72.56.
Looking at the hourly chart of crude oil futures below, the ups and downs have been regular and consistent If I were to put a box around the ups and downs, the low is around $70.16. The high is around $74.24. The price had one break below the lower end of the range (on January 3), and one break above the higher end of the range on January 12. Each of those breaks failed fairly quickly (after a few hours).
In between, sits the aforementioned hourly moving averages. Admittedly, the market isn’t paying much attention to those moving averages. The market is more focused on selling high near the higher extreme and buying low versus the lower extreme.
At some point the price will break outside this range, but it will likely be some shock. Until then, think about buying low and selling high using the extremes.