Forex Pros – Crude oil futures edged lower on Wednesday, amid concerns over a slowdown in demand from the world’s largest user, while a stronger dollar also weighed.
On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in August traded at USD93.65 a barrel during European morning trade, dipping 0.1%.
It earlier fell to a daily low of USD93.32 a barrel.
The American Petroleum Institute, an industry group said in a report on Tuesday that U.S. crude inventories fell by a modest 0.81 million barrels to 362.9 million last week. Analysts had expected crude supplies to decline by 1.4 million barrels.
Stocks of gasoline dropped 1.52 million barrels to 211.9 million, confounding expectations for a 1 million barrel increase.
The U.S. Energy Department was to release its closely-watched crude oil inventories report for the week ended June 17 later in the day.
The data was expected to show that U.S. crude oil stockpiles declined by 1.6 million barrels, while gasoline supplies were forecast to rise by 0.8 million barrels.
Meanwhile, the dollar index, which tracks the performance of the greenback versus a basket of six other major currencies, was up 0.12% to trade at 75.09.
Dollar-denominated oil futures contracts tend to fall when the dollar rises, as this makes oil more expensive for holders of other currencies.
Influential Wall Street bank Goldman Sachs said in a report late Tuesday that oil prices were expected to remain ‘choppy’ in the near-term as the market reacts to a slowdown in economic growth, before rising again in the second half of the year amid increasing demand.
Elsewhere, on the ICE Futures Exchange, Brent oil futures for August delivery rose 0.9% to trade at USD111.39 a barrel, up USD17.74 on its U.S. counterpart.
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