Oil prices edged lower on Thursday after three days of increases as the prospect of a rapid decline in demand due to travel bans and national blockades overthrow optimism related to the 2-trillion-dollar stimulus to boost economic activity.

The international Brent variety fell by 0.33 USD, or 1.24%, to 27.05 USD per barrel, while the futures on the US light crude oil WTI wiped out 2.16% to 23.96 USD per barrel.

“With blockades in many countries, demand is expected to decline by more than 10 million barrels per day. Such a loss in demand will increase oversupply”, noted analysts at Australia and New Zealand Banking Group.

It is expected that after the expiry of the agreement to cut production between OPEC+ countries, the level of supply will increase, with Saudi Arabia planning to increase production by more than 10 million barrels per day from May.

“Production of Saudi Arabia and Russia is increasing, and things still seem uncertain due to the ongoing price war between the two countries”, said Australia and New Zealand Banking Group.

On the other hand, crude oil inventories in the US have increased by 1.6 million barrels in the last week, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) said on Wednesday. This is the ninth consecutive week that the country’s commodity stocks are up.

Shipments of petroleum products, a US demand indicator, have fallen by nearly 10% to 19.4 million barrels per day, the EIA figures show.