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Crude oil slips to $74/barrel

25 January 2010 08:27 (UTC +04:00)

Bakuâ€“ APA-Economics. Crude oil fell for a fourth day as sliding equity markets and expectations of interest rate increases in China dented investor confidence in the strength of the global economic recovery., Bloomberg reported.
OPEC nations must improve their compliance with the group’s output quotas to prevent further pressure on oil prices, Shokri Ghanem, chairman of Libya’s National Oil Corp., said yesterday. A report today in the US, the world’s largest oil user, will probably show existing home-sales fell for the first time in four months, according to a Bloomberg News survey of economists.
Crude oil for March delivery fell as much as 43 cents, or 0.6 per cent, to $US74.11 a barrel in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was at $US74.30 in Sydney.
The contract dropped 2 per cent to $US74.54 a barrel on January 22, the lowest settlement since December 22. Prices slumped 4.9 per cent last week as US gasoline stockpiles reached a 22-month high, equities and commodities tumbled on the nation’s bank reform plans, and investors fretted that China will raise interest rates to slow growth in the world’s second-largest energy consumer.
Brent oil for March settlement fell 23 cents, or 0.3 per cent, to $US72.60 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. It fell 2.3 per cent $US72.83 on January 22.
Hedge-fund managers and other large speculators reduced their bets on rising oil prices for the first time in five weeks, based on US Commodity Futures Trading Commission data.
Speculative net-long positions, the difference between orders to buy and sell the commodity, fell 1 per cent to 134,381 contracts in the week ended January 19, the commission said last week. Positions a week earlier were the highest in at least 27 years.