Oil Majors Outpace Crude as Equities Decouple from Commodity Slump

Oil majors continued to diverge from underlying commodity prices in early 2025, as shares of the largest international producers advanced even while crude benchmarks weakened. Despite a roughly 20% decline in global oil prices over the year, investors rewarded integrated energy companies for maintaining shareholder returns, emphasizing cash distributions and disciplined capital spending. Market participants also reacted positively to a renewed emphasis on upstream growth by European majors, record-shattering Permian Basin output from U.S. supermajors, and early cost and operational synergies from recent large-scale acquisitions—all of which helped decouple equity performance from spot-price volatility in Oil – Brent Crude, Oil – US Crude, and Natural Gas.

Over the past month, oil prices have firmed, with Brent crude up about 7.9% and U.S. crude gaining roughly 7.2%, reflecting tighter supply expectations and improved risk sentiment after the earlier selloff. This modest rebound supports the narrative that equity investors are looking past short-term price swings toward medium-term cash-flow generation. From a technical standpoint, both Brent and U.S. crude currently show a short-term bullish bias, with 1-day signals at Buy and Buy, respectively, suggesting near-term upward momentum. In contrast, natural gas has fallen around 18.4% over the last month amid persistent oversupply and mild weather conditions in key consuming regions, and its 1-day technical stance is skewed negatively, with a Sell signal pointing to continued pressure on prices. Investors can explore more updates, prices, and analysis across global markets at Commodities.