By V. Phani Kumar, MarketWatch
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) — U.S. crude-oil prices held their ground above the $101 level in electronic trading Wednesday, wavering around the previous day’s closing level as cautious investors stayed on the sidelines ahead of a European leaders’ summit.
Light, sweet crude-oil futures for January delivery CL2F +0.14% inched up 16 cents, or 0.2% from the New York settlement level, to $101.44 a barrel on Globex during Asian trading hours.
The front-month contract moved between small gains and losses, as it did for most of the regular session on the New York Mercantile Exchange overnight, before finishing mildly higher.
The mild gains came after data released by the American Petroleum Institute Tuesday said crude inventories for the week ended Dec. 2 fell by 5 million barrels.
“While supportive for crude oil, we note that distillate and gasoline inventories rose by a combined 7.7 [million barrels], suggesting that the net result may have been bearish overall,” Citi Futures Perspective analyst Tim Evans wrote in a note.
The more closely watched data from the Energy Information Administration were due to be released later on Wednesday.
The cautious trading in oil also came ahead of a key meeting of leaders from the European Union countries, scheduled for Friday in Brussels, to discuss plans for tighter fiscal regulations and treaty changes. Read blog about European bond yields and the EU summit.
The U.S. dollar DXY -0.07% , in which crude-oil is normally priced, weakened slightly against major counterparts. The dollar index DXY -0.07% , which measures the greenback against six other major currencies, eased to 78.448 versus 78.498 in North America late Tuesday.
Also supporting crude-oil prices, Asian stocks and U.S. index futures were trading higher. Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA +0.43% futures were up 60 points at 12,172, while benchmark stock indexes in Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Australia were up between 0.7% and 1.2% in afternoon trade. Read Asia Markets.
Varahabhotla Phani Kumar is a reporter in MarketWatch's Hong Kong bureau.
