SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) – Crude-oil futures rose Friday, tracking narrow gains in U.S. stocks and buoyed by growth in wholesales inventories that met expectations.

Crude for August delivery added 69 cents to $76.15 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The crude contract fluctuated in early floor trading but gathered steam as U.S. stocks built modest buying momentum. Technology stocks propped up the main equity indexes. Read more about stocks.

Stocks are oil’s “latest hangout buddies,” said Peter Beutel, president of trading advisory firm Cameron Hanover in Connecticut. Prices are likely to move in tandem with stocks in the absence of other news and supply data, he added.

“The assumption is if the stock market is higher, it implies increased economic activity” and therefore more demand for oil, Beutel said.

In the one bit of U.S. economic news out Friday, wholesale inventories rose in May as warehouses were restocked with durable goods, a government report showed. Wholesale sales dropped a little, but they were up 15% from May 2009.

“As long as we have the economy stable — not great, but stable — we are going to see higher oil prices,” said Carl Larry, president of Oil Outlooks and Opinions in Houston. “We know the commercial side of America is growing. … People are buying goods, and these goods have to be made, they have to be delivered, and people have to drive to buy them.”

Oil futures snapped a six-session losing streak early this week amid hopeful signs about the global economic recovery. Reports of boosted global oil demand and a surprisingly large decrease in stockpiles also lent support to prices earlier in the week.

On Wednesday, the Energy Information Administration revised its forecast, saying it underestimated oil consumption in 2009. The agency expects global oil demand to rise by 1.5 million barrels a day in 2010 and 2011.

And on Thursday, the EIA reported a decline of 5 million barrels in the nation’s crude inventories last week.

Meanwhile, natural gas for August delivery reversed higher, adding 4 cents, or 0.8%, to $4.44 per million British thermal units. August reformulated gasoline gained a penny to $2.06 a gallon.

But for the week, natural gas has lost 6% so far. Gasoline futures have gained 3.9% this week.

The dollar index (DXY 83.94, +0.11, +0.13%) , which compares the U.S. unit to a basket of six other currencies, added 0.1% to 83.93. A stronger dollar usually pressures commodities prices as it makes them more expensive to holders of other currencies, but the stock market gains cancelled out that dynamics for Friday.

The euro (CUR_EURUSD 1.2644, -0.0052, -0.4095%) was marginally lower after hitting a two-month high on Thursday.

Claudia Assis is a San Francisco-based reporter for MarketWatch.
Cynthia Lin is a MarketWatch reporter based in New York.

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