The price of crude oil was ticking lower Thursday morning as traders focus on developments surrounding the US fiscal cliff with approximately $600 billion in automatic tax hikes and spending cuts due to come into effect on January 1.
Light Sweet Crude Oil (WTI) futures for February delivery, slipped $0.11 to $90.87 a barrel.
This morning, the U.S. dollar was slipping back toward a 7-month low versus the euro and paring recent gains against sterling. The buck was advancing to a fresh 2-year high versus the yen and ticking lower against the Swiss franc.
In economic news from the euro zone, confidence among French consumers improved in December for the first time since May this year, the latest figures from the statistical office Insee showed. The headline synthetic index rose to 86 in December from 84 in November. Economists expected the index reading to remain at previous month's level.
Traders will look to the weekly jobless claims data from the US Labor Department due out at 8.30 a.m ET. Economists expect the claims to edge up to 365,000 from the last week's 361,000.
