Platts Market Insight: Oil markets watch the virus-vaccine tug-of-war

AS the race between humans and virus gathers pace, the oil markets can only watch this tug-of-war between a rapidly spreading COVID-19 and a patchy vaccine deployment playing out.

The world watched rather euphorically when governments began approving vaccines last month, but the persistent spread of the virus since has cast a shadow over the outlook for 2021, though most analysts are optimistic that humans will take the lead in this race in the second half of the year, if not earlier.