By Barbara Kollmeyer, MarketWatch
MADRID (MarketWatch)—Crude-oil prices rose on Friday as commodity prices across the board clawed back ground lost the prior day and supply worries held up prices.
Crude oil for May delivery CLK2 +0.20% rose 50 cents, or 0.5%, to $105.85 in European trading hours, following a loss of $1.92, or 1.8%, in the prior session, settling at $105.35. Crude is set to lose around 1.8% this week.
A weak purchasing managers’ survey out of China weighed on crude and other commodities on Thursday. Crude also fell amid reports France and other industrialized nations could release strategic oil reserves. China, India rock gold, oil commodity markets
Markets also took note of comments by President Barack Obama that his administration would fast-track approval of a pipeline aimed at easing supply bottlenecks in the U.S.
A survey from Reuters revealed Friday that global oil supply outages were running at 1.2 million barrels a day in March, due to geopolitical unrest, adverse weather and technical problems all cutting into supply.
Some analysts appeared to be at odds over the direction of oil.
“From a fundamental point of view, we see a strong case for a significant downside correction in oil prices, with the implementation obviously being subject to the weights attributed to geopolitical risk factors and managed money operations,” said analysts at JBC Energy, in a note to investors.
They said the crude market has been supported over recent months by record purchases from Asian countries that had feared potential loss of supply from places such as Iran.
But analysts at Danske Bank said a tighter oil market and geopolitical risks will keep oil prices higher this year and next. They raised their 2012 and 2013 forecast for Brent oil from $114 and $120 a barrel to $127 and $129 a barrel, respectively.
Rounding out the energy futures, April heating oil HOJ2 +0.29% rose 2 cents to $3.20 a gallon and April gasoline RBJ2 +0.07% added 2 cents to stand at $3.36 a gallon.
April natural gas NGJ12 +0.57% tacked on 2 cents, or 0.6%, to $2.29 per million British thermal units after settling at the lowest since March 12 the day prior after the Energy Information Administration reported an increase in supplies that came at the top end of the range expected by analysts.
Barbara Kollmeyer is an editor for MarketWatch in Madrid.
