Oil Futures Move Higher in Asia; Brent Trades Around $112/Bbl
By Eric Yep
Crude-oil futures moved slightly higher in Asian hours Thursday, with markets reopening after the Christmas holiday.
On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in February traded at $99.39 a barrel at 0606 GMT, up $0.17 in the Globex electronic session. February Brent crude on London's ICE Futures exchange rose $0.12 to $112.02 a barrel.
U.S. oil markets digested weekly oil inventory data from the American Petroleum Institute, a trade group, which was published after Nymex WTI crude closed 31 cents higher at $99.22 a barrel on Tuesday.
Oil stockpiles for the week ended Dec. 20 rose by 500,000 barrels, API data showed. A rise in inventory is bearish for oil, but the API data conflicted with market expectations of a drop in weekly oil stockpiles.
U.S. oil stocks are expected to have declined by 2.2 million barrels, on average, last week, according to nine analysts polled by The Wall Street Journal. The more closely-watched inventory data from the Energy Information Administration is due Friday.
Meanwhile, strength in wider financial markets and escalating violence in South Sudan provided a floor for oil prices.
South Sudan President Salva Kiir has urged an end to ethnic strife that threatens to further curb the country's oil output. Violence has been raging in the oil-producing northern states of Unity and Upper Nile.
In Egypt, the government declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization on Wednesday, citing its alleged involvement in a recent bombing. Egypt's Suez Canal is a vital transit point for global oil trade and political instability affects oil prices.
"Supply outages supported oil prices in 2013 and created room for significant North American supply increases," BNP Paribas said in a note, adding that without outages in regions like Sudan, Syria and Yemen, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries would have had to make bigger production cuts.
It said it expects acceleration in oil demand growth in 2014 to moderate the scale of cuts that OPEC will need to make and is comfortable with its current Brent oil forecast of $110 a barrel for 2014.
Nymex reformulated gasoline blendstock for January--the benchmark gasoline contract--rose 51 points to $2.8193 a gallon, while January heating oil traded at $3.0835, 52 points higher.
ICE gasoil for January changed hands at $947.50 a metric ton, up $3.25 from Wednesday's settlement.
Write to Eric Yep at eric.yep@wsj.com
By Eric Yep
Crude-oil futures moved slightly higher in Asian hours Thursday, with markets reopening after the Christmas holiday.
On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in February traded at $99.39 a barrel at 0606 GMT, up $0.17 in the Globex electronic session. February Brent crude on London's ICE Futures exchange rose $0.12 to $112.02 a barrel.
U.S. oil markets digested weekly oil inventory data from the American Petroleum Institute, a trade group, which was published after Nymex WTI crude closed 31 cents higher at $99.22 a barrel on Tuesday.
Oil stockpiles for the week ended Dec. 20 rose by 500,000 barrels, API data showed. A rise in inventory is bearish for oil, but the API data conflicted with market expectations of a drop in weekly oil stockpiles.
U.S. oil stocks are expected to have declined by 2.2 million barrels, on average, last week, according to nine analysts polled by The Wall Street Journal. The more closely-watched inventory data from the Energy Information Administration is due Friday.
Meanwhile, strength in wider financial markets and escalating violence in South Sudan provided a floor for oil prices.
South Sudan President Salva Kiir has urged an end to ethnic strife that threatens to further curb the country's oil output. Violence has been raging in the oil-producing northern states of Unity and Upper Nile.
In Egypt, the government declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization on Wednesday, citing its alleged involvement in a recent bombing. Egypt's Suez Canal is a vital transit point for global oil trade and political instability affects oil prices.
"Supply outages supported oil prices in 2013 and created room for significant North American supply increases," BNP Paribas said in a note, adding that without outages in regions like Sudan, Syria and Yemen, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries would have had to make bigger production cuts.
It said it expects acceleration in oil demand growth in 2014 to moderate the scale of cuts that OPEC will need to make and is comfortable with its current Brent oil forecast of $110 a barrel for 2014.
Nymex reformulated gasoline blendstock for January--the benchmark gasoline contract--rose 51 points to $2.8193 a gallon, while January heating oil traded at $3.0835, 52 points higher.
ICE gasoil for January changed hands at $947.50 a metric ton, up $3.25 from Wednesday's settlement.
Write to Eric Yep at eric.yep@wsj.com
