Crude oil prices came down on Thursday as global shipping giants gear up to resume traversing the Red Sea despite an ongoing Houthi missile barrage. As of 1210 hours GMT, Brent, the international benchmark for two-thirds of the world’s oil, shed $0.90 (-1.13 percent) to reach $78.75 a barrel. The West Texas Intermediate (WTI), the main oil benchmark for North America, went down by $0.83 (-1.12 per cent) to $73.28 a barrel. Brent ended the last week higher by 3.29 percent while WTI registered an uptick of 2.98 percent. However, the price of Russian Sokol increased by $0.14 (+0.19 percent) to $73.36. Arab Light prices witnessed an increase of $0.15 (+0.18 percent) to reach $82.03 a barrel. On the other hand, the price for Opec Basket went down to $80.84 a barrel with a decrease of $0.40 (-0.49 percent). The OPEC Reference Basket of Crudes (ORB) is made up of Saharan Blend, Girassol, Djeno, Zafiro, Rabi Light, Iran Heavy, Basra Light, Kuwait Export, Es Sider, Bonny Light, Arab Light, Murban and Merey. Oil prices have continued to track down on faith that a US-led international task force, dubbed Prosperity Guardian, will be able to protect merchant vessels from Houthi targeting in the Red Sea, on the way to the Suez Canal. Earlier on Wednesday, Danish shipping giant Maersk confirmed it had scheduled dozens of vessels for the Suez Canal, via the Red Sea, in the coming weeks after a temporary halt. The Houthis are targeting merchant vessels going through the Bab al-Mandab Strait between Djibouti and Yemen. U.S. Central Naval Command has released data showing a minimum of 15 commercial ships attacked by the Houthis in November and December, with the most recent attack on Tuesday, December 26. While Maersk and others are resuming shipping in the Red Sea, using evasive maneuver, Germany’s Hapag-Lloyd said on Wednesday that it would not be following suit, deeming the Suez Canal route still too dangerous despite US military protection. Instead, the shipping giant will reroute vessels via the Cape of Good Hope, which adds 3,500 nautical miles to the trip and a concomitant increase in shipping costs. Hapag-Lloyd is the fifth-largest shipping company in the world by capacity. Meanwhile, the US crude oil inventories rose this week by 1.837 million barrels for the week ending December 22, according to the American Petroleum Institute (API), after recording a 939,000-barrel build in crude inventories in the week prior. API data shows a net build in crude oil inventories in the United States of just over 21mn barrels so far this year.