NYMEX mogas gains, crude off a bit ahead of API
NEW YORK, Feb 2 (Reuters) - A spurt of late light buying pushed up front month gasoline on the New York Mercantile Exchange while crude oil and heating oil futures pared losses at the close Tuesday, traders said.
Crude futures were rangebound most of the day, amid forecasts of a build in U.S. crude stocks, ahead of the inventory data for the week ended Jan. 29 from the American Petroleum Institute. The report will be released early evening Tuesday.
Heating oil futures moved along with crude and ended with small losses.
A NYMEX floor trader said that in the waning minutes of the session, locals pushed up gasoline. Locals are traders who do business for their own accounts.
Front month gasoline settled at 37.61 cents a gallon, up 0.34 cent, after last trading at 37.55 cents. Near the close, it traded as high as 37.65. Earlier in the day, it dipped to 36.70 cents.
NYMEX March crude cut most of its losses, settling at $12.30 a barrel, down seven cents, after last trading at $12.28, down nine cents. In late trade it dipped to an intraday low of $12.11. It earlier touched $12.33, its session high.
Front month heating oil ended at 32.34 cents a gallon, down 16 cents, after reaching 32.30 cents, at the close. The contract traded in the 31.90/32.50-cent range.
In a Reuter poll, traders and analysts forecast a crude stockbuild of 3.1 million barrels for the week ending Jan. 29, citing recent U.S. refinery run cuts as well as scheduled and unscheduled maintenance. Last week, API data showed a crude build of 5.4 million barrels.
The run cuts were expected to create a draw in distillates stocks, which include heating oil and diesel, of 2.125 million barrels, they said.
They also predicted a small build in gasoline of 1.0 million barrels. But there were poll participants who said they expect a draw in gasoline of betweeen 1.0 million to 3.0 million barrels.
Traders said that despite predictions of a draw in distillates, they see bearishness for heating oil because of forecasts of warmer weather ahead.
NYMEX traders brushed aside news that OPEC President Youssef Yousfi was holding talks with some non-OPEC producers for a possible meeting this month with OPEC to address the current oil price slump.
"We hope to reach a consensus with non-OPEC producer countries to correct the market situation. The only solution lies in cutting production," said Yousfi, who is Algeria's energy and mines minister. Analysts say producers need to cut further by about 1.0 million barerls per day (bpd) to rebalance the market.
But they don't see any quick consensus among producers because of sticking points left in the last meeting of OPEC in November, including how to measure the baseline from Iran's cuts and the slow progress of Venezuela in complying fully with its pledge to cut output by 525,000 bpd.
On Tuesday, a Reuter survey showed that OPEC output rose in January by 360,000 bpd to 27.81 million bpd from 27.45 million in December.
Compliance with OPEC's output-cut pledges last June slumped to 66 percent in January or 1.727 million bpd, out of 2.6 million bpd the group pledged last year. The compliance level excludes Iraq, which is not part of last year's agreements.
Among OPEC's major producers, Venezuela remained more than 100,000 bpd short of its commitment, but the new Venezuelan Oil Minister, Ali Rodriguez has pledged that his country would meet the target this month.
|
