Prices drop on IEA's latest report
Crude prices witnessed their largest weekly drop in six months during last week that ended on Friday, 10 July, 2009. Prices fell as a new report from the International Energy Agency reaffirmed concerns about weak demand. The dollar was also higher against most of its major rivals.
On Friday, crude-oil futures for light sweet crude for August delivery closed at $59.89/barrel (lower by $0.52 or 0.9%). For the week, crude ended lower by 10.3%.
For the month of June, 2009, crude ended higher by 5.5%. In May, crude had registered the largest monthly gain in a decade rising 30%. For the second quarter, crude ended higher by 40%. Crude prices had rallied 11.3% in the first quarter of 2009.
Oil prices had reached a high of $147 on 11 July, 2008 but have dropped almost 67% since then. Year to date, in 2009, crude prices are higher by 36.2%.
In its latest report, IEA, the energy adviser to 28 developed countries, projected in the monthly report that this year's global oil demand will fall 2.9% from a year ago, unchanged from the agency's prediction a month ago. Global oil demand is expected to stand at 83.8 million barrels a day this year, which represents an annual contraction of 2.9%, or 2.5 million barrels a day. On the brighter side, the IEA expects 2010 demand to rise by 1.7%, or 1.4 million barrels of oil a day, to 85.2 million barrels a day.
Earlier during the week, EIA reported in its short-term energy outlook that it expects a smaller decline in global oil consumption this year due to better-than-expected economic activity in Asia. The EIA now projects oil consumption to fall by 1.6 million barrels a day compared with a decline of 1.7 million barrels a day in its June outlook. The price of crude oil is expected to average near $70 per barrel through the second half of 2009.
Also at the Nymex on Friday, August reformulated gasoline fell 1.33 cents, or 0.8%, to $1.6505 a gallon and August heating oil fell slightly to $1.5335 a gallon.
August natural gas futures fell 3.5 cents, or 1%, to $3.373 per million British thermal units.
Crude prices had ended FY 2008 lower by 54%, the largest yearly loss since trading began at Nymex.
At the MCX, crude oil for July delivery closed at Rs 2,929/barrel, higher by Rs 3 (0.03%) against previous day's close. Natural gas for July delivery closed at Rs 165.6/mmbtu, lower by Rs 0.3/mmbtu (0.18%).
