Crude prices mixed on OPEC demand projections

Crude oil prices were mixed in afternoon trade in New York on Tuesday, gaining early on demand growth reports from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries and the US Energy Information Administration but declining later as projections expected tomorrow’s EIA report on US inventories to show that stockpiles of crude oil, gasoline and distillates all rose again last week.

At around 2 p.m. on the US East Coast, June contracts for West Texas Intermediate crude were 18 cents lower to $76.62 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, but at last report Brent crude was trading 43 cents higher to $80.55 per barrel on the ICE Futures Europe exchange in London.

The OPEC report projected an increase in demand globally this year, to 85.38 million barrels per day, a gain of 950,000 barrels per day over last year, while the EIA report predicted that total energy consumption will rise 14 percent by 2035 and energy costs will go up by 2.4 percent per year.

Additionally, a survey of analysts showed that the weekly EIA US inventories report will show that crude oil inventories were up by 1.7 million barrels last week, while gasoline and distillates stockpiles were also up.

Nymex June gasoline and heating oil futures each added 2 cents in afternoon trade, to $2.19 per gallon and $2.14 per gallon respectively, while June natural gas futures dropped 2 cents to $4.15 per million British thermal units.

The retail price of a gallon of gasoline in the US was down more than 0.5 cent overnight to $2.90 per gallon on average nationally, according to AAA.