* Investors await Fed statement, key economic data this week * Export curbs limit oil price losses * Coming up: API weekly inventory data at 2030 GMT (Updates previous SINGAPORE) By Peg Mackey LONDON, July 30 (Reuters) - Brent crude hovered above $107 a barrel on Tuesday as investors awaited a Federal Reserve meeting for clues on the prospects for a U.S. stimulus programme that has bolstered demand in the world's top oil consumer. Investors also avoided taking big positions ahead of economic data this week including U.S. payroll numbers and manufacturing from China, the world's second largest oil consumer. Brent futures slipped 27 cents to $107.18 a barrel by 0937 GMT, after falling 0.8 percent last week. U.S. crude fell 64 cents to $103.91, pressured by a recovery in the U.S. dollar. The North Sea benchmark's premium over its U.S. counterpart widened to $3.27. "Market participants are likely to be exercising restraint in the run-up to tomorrow's Fed meeting and Thursday's publication of Chinese figures, so little in the way of price movement can be expected again today," said a Commerzbank research note. The U.S. central bank is expected to issue a statement after its two-day meeting ends on Wednesday. U.S. inventory data will also offer an insight on the country's oil demand. U.S. commercial crude oil stockpiles likely fell last week for the fifth straight week, a Reuters poll of six analysts showed on Monday. Elsewhere, investors fretted that the manufacturing surveys later this week might highlight weakness in China. Activity in China's vast manufacturing sector may have contracted in July for the first time in 10 months, a Reuters poll showed, signalling a protracted slowdown in the world's second-largest economy as demand at home and abroad sags. SUPPLY CURTAILED Losses in oil prices were limited as exports from several suppliers have been curbed in recent weeks. Assailants attacked an Islamist party office in Tripoli on Monday and a soldier was killed in fighting in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi, officials said, in an escalation of violence following the assassination of a political activist last week. The Libyan oil minister said operations at the crude oil export terminals of Es Sider and Ras Lanuf continued as normal, despite protests and strikes. Also supporting oil prices were expectations that Iraq, OPEC's second-biggest producer, will report an output decline for 2013, its first after two years of robust gains. (Additional reporting by Jessica Jaganathan in Singapore; editing by James Jukwey)

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