Technical overview remains volatile on the daily time frame, while in sentiment it’s a story of heavy to extreme buy bias.
By Monte Safieddine, Head of Research at Capital.com
Shutterstock: Oil Rig
You’ve probably heard the term ‘risk-off’ in the financial markets. That’s where investors due to uncertainty or negative news move away from riskier assets like stocks in favor of safer ones like U.S. Treasuries or gold. And that’s what we saw as market participants digested the weekend actions on the geopolitical scene, with key equity index futures gapping lower while gold gapped higher and at one point wasn’t far off $5,400.
Oil gaps higher:
But there is one obvious exception. A classic risk-off move usually sees commodities associated with economic activity like oil move lower but when that uncertainty hits an oil-rich region where energy supply could be disrupted, oil goes up. Way up. Gapping about 11% higher but where a chunk of that gap got filled. If it remains high, it would be an inflation headache for central banks still struggling to bring their CPI (Consumer Price Index) readings back to target. We’re in a headline-driven market where updates can easily cause movements as markets try to price in the latest news and traders tussle over where they see things headed. A prolonged supply disruption would exacerbate the situation as both sides talk of increased action while reports differ over whether they’re willing to go back to the negotiating table.
Meanwhile, OPEC+ over the weekend agreed to raise April’s output by 206K bpd (barrels per day), and last Friday’s weekly rig count data out of Baker Hughes showed the number of US oil rigs at 407, down from 409 previously. Looking at other data released on Friday and it wasn’t pretty on the pricing front, as PPI (Producer Price Index) was up 0.5% m/m (month-on-month) above forecast and more so for its core which excludes food and energy, rising 0.8% instead of the 0.3% estimate. The y/y headline figure failed to drop from 3% to 2.6% reaching 2.9% instead, while core y/y jumped from 3.3% to 3.6%.
Week ahead:
As for the week ahead, aside from digesting updates on the geopolitical front in what will likely be a headline-driven environment, we’ve got manufacturing PMIs (Purchasing Managers’ Index) today, services PMIs on Wednesday, the weekly claims on Thursday before the market-impacting Non-Farm Payrolls on Friday with retail sales releasing at the same time. In energy, the weekly releases are expected out of API tomorrow, EIA on Wednesday and Thursday for oil and natural gas, respectively, and Baker Hughes on Friday.
WTI’s technical overview, strategies and levels:
Looking at the daily time frame and price is easily above its main moving averages (MA), above the upper end of the Bollinger Band that was built on relatively narrower moves prior, on the DMI (Directional Movement Index) front the +DI now well over the -DI to classify it as positive, an RSI (Relative Strength Index) after the close in overbought territory, and an ADX (Average Directional Movement Index) that was and still is in trending territory. The key technicals are positive on the weekly time frame even if its ADX by one measure isn’t in trending territory just yet and its weekly RSI just shy of overbought.
Tempting as it may be to label the technical overview as something bullish, it was and still is ‘volatile’ on the daily time frame due to the ability for outside factors to sway shorter-term levels with great ease as witnessed in the recent past but was more obvious at the open. For the weekly time frame, the overview was ‘consolidation – volatile’ where the wider longer-term weekly 2nd levels had a better chance of holding minor headlines, but has shifted to ‘volatile’ given recent headlines are major and can see moves beyond the weekly 1st levels as witnessed earlier this morning.
Strategies for conformists who see the volatility persisting (or worsening) have breakout strategies be it going with the move if it breaches the 1st Resistance level expecting key levels to fail in containing any significant update, or via selling the 1st Support level should it go back down. Contrarians who expect price action to moderate (for whatever reason) would be going against the move but ideally only doing so after a significant reversal letting the market run its course and only initiating opposite after it pulls back from a significant move beyond a key level.
Capital.com’s client sentiment for WTI:
Client sentiment was a heavy buy 71% late last week but has moved into extreme buy territory this morning as longs jumped in on the move, opposite what was occurring prior where they’d unwind on price gains and get back in on a pullback.
Larger speculators, according to the latest CoT (Commitment of Traders) report, remain in heavy buy territory but have upped their net long sentiment by a couple notches to 74% from 72% prior. Keep in mind that for client sentiment positioning is as of this morning while CoT speculators are from last Tuesday’s positioning and in turn the latter’s figures have yet to reflect the latest fundamental updates.
Client sentiment mapped on the daily chart:
Period: December 2025 – March 2026
Past performance is not an indicator of future results.
WTI’s chart on Capital.com’s platform with key technical indicators
Period: November 2025 – March 2026
Past performance is not an indicator of future results
