Oil hovers around $78.80, U.S. stocks eyed
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2/24/10LONDON (Reuters) – Oil oscillated around $78.80, reining in earlier losses on Wednesday as a strike at Total’s French refineries looked set to end and the dollar slipped after comments from the U.S. Fed chairman and poor housing sales.
Oil market players will also be watching for further information on U.S. crude inventories in the week to February 19 from figures due at 1600 GMT from the Energy Information Administration (EIA).
U.S. crude for April was up 5 cents to $78.91 by 1514 GMT while London ICE Brent was down 4 cents at $77.21. U.S. crude touched a low of $78.25 while Brent dipped at one point to $76.63.
The first group of Total’s French refinery workers voted to go back to work after company pledges on maintaining plants and jobs, signaling the end of a week-long strike that had threatened fuel supplies.
Bernanke told Congress a weak job market and low inflation would likely allow the central bank to keep interest rates at very low levels for a long time.
Data also showed sales of newly-built U.S. single-family homes fell unexpectedly to a record low in January, hinting at potential trouble for the fragile housing market recovery.
The dollar slipped against the euro after Bernanke’s comments and the housing data raised doubts about the strength of recovery in the U.S. economy.
Oil market players are closely watching U.S. crude inventory data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) due at 1600 GMT for a clearer direction for the market.
“The U.S. inventory report this afternoon is the most important factor for the oil market today,” said Carsten Fritsch at Commerzbank.
“Will those figures show imports rising as much as in the API report — 1.2 million barrels is really massive,” he added.
On Tuesday, the American Petroleum Institute (API) said crude oil imports rose 1.2 million barrels per day (bpd) to 9.19 million bpd, while inventories fell 3.1 million barrels and refinery runs rose marginally to 80.8 percent of capacity.
(Editing by James Jukwey)
