Crude reverses course and settles higher

Prices register 1% weekly gains

Crude prices traded lower for most part of the day on Friday, 04 November at Nymex. Prices pared earlier losses at the end and managed to end marginally higher going into close. Mixed bag of economic data and strong dollar pushed prices lower earlier during the day.

Light and sweet crude for November delivery rose $0.19 (0.4%) to $94.26 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Friday. For the week, crude gained 1%. For the month of October, oil futures gained 18%. During the third quarter ending in September, crude incurred losses of 17%. It was the worst quarterly performance for crude in almost two years.



The Labor Department in US reported on Friday, 04 November 2011 that the economy gained a net 80,000 jobs in October, with the jobless rate falling to 9.0% from 9.1%. Market had predicted a net gain of 90,000 jobs. No change was expected in the unemployment rate.

In the currency market on Friday, the Dollar Index, which weighs the strength of dollar against basket of six other currencies rose by 0.6%.

In the weekly inventory report, the Energy Information Administration reported during the week an increase of 1.8 million barrels in crude supplies in the week ended 28 October 2011. Market had expected to see a rise of 1.1 million barrels. The EIA also reported a rise of 1.4 million barrels for gasoline supplies, and a decrease of 3.6 million barrels for stockpiles of distillates. Market had expected a decline in gasoline inventories by 1.5 million barrels, and a decrease of 2.2 million barrels for distillates.

Among other energy products on Friday, the products traded higher, ignoring weakness in crude futures. December gasoline rose 2 cents, or 0.8%, to $2.66 a gallon. Gasoline gained 0.7% this week. December heating oil gained 3 cents, up 1.1%, to $3.07 a gallon. The product rose 0.1% this week.

December natural gas rose less than a penny to end at $3.78 per million British thermal units. On the week, natural gas lost 3.6%. That was natural gas's worst week since early October.