The discount on Western Canada Select crude oil to North American benchmark West Texas Intermediate futures widened on Thursday.
WCS for August delivery in Hardisty, Alberta, settled at $15.25 a barrel below the U.S. benchmark WTI, according to brokerage CalRock, compared to $13.90 a barrel on Tuesday. Wednesday was a national holiday in Canada.
* The discount is now trading at levels similar to May, having unwound most of the tightening that took place in June due to wet weather and a temporary outage at Cenovus Energy that affected oil sands production.
* Globally, oil prices made small gains on Thursday as buyers sought to assure supply over the long U.S. Independence Day weekend.
* Thursday was the start of the Canadian crude market’s trade cycle, which runs from the first of each month until the day before pipeline nominations are due, and in which the bulk of the trading activity takes place.
(Reporting by Amanda Stephenson in Calgary; Editing by Maju Samuel)