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Oil prices hovers over $40

05 February 2009 07:57 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Vahab Rzayev â€“ APA-Economics. Crude oil was little changed after falling on a government report that showed U.S. inventories of the fuel jumped more than twice the amount analysts forecast, Bloomberg reports.
Supplies rose 7.2 million barrels to 346.1 million barrels last week, the highest since July 2007, according to the Energy Department yesterday. Inventories were forecast to climb 3 million barrels, according to a Bloomberg News survey. U.S. fuel demand during the past four weeks averaged 19.5 million barrels a day, down 2.8 percent from a year earlier, the report showed.
Crude oil for March delivery was at $40.47 a barrel, up 15 cents, in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange at 2:08 p.m. Singapore time. It earlier fell as much as 27 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $40.05 a barrel.
Brent crude oil for March settlement was at $44.40 a barrel, up 25 cents, on Londonâ€™s ICE Futures Europe exchange at 1:58 p.m. in Singapore.
Prices are down 9.3 percent this year and 54 percent from a year earlier.
Crude oil has been trading at about $40 a barrel level in the past three days. The 30-day historical price volatility for crude oil has fallen to 97 these two days, the first time the reading has dropped below 100 in about six weeks, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.