WTI December Crude Settles at $96.09, Down 0.41%

The intraday round trip is the real story here: a steady climb to a session high that was erased almost entirely within roughly an hour points to a fragile, headline-driven tape rather than a change in underlying fundamentals. That kind of reversal matters most for short-term traders and for anyone using crude as a macro sentiment gauge, since it suggests rallies are being sold into quickly. Whether that pattern of sharp givebacks persists into the next session is the open question, and the natural gas settle offers a separate read on how energy complexes are diverging.