The price of crude oil was little changed Thursday morning on concerns over demand growth following Energy Information Administration's weekly crude oil report.
Light Sweet Crude Oil (WTI) futures for September delivery, edged up $0.05 to $104.42 a barrel. Yesterday, oil extended losses for a third session to settle below $105 after the Energy Information Administration's weekly oil report showed crude inventories to have dropped less than expected last week. Investors continued to worry over the U.S. Federal Reserve's plans to tone down its quantitative easing program, while awaiting further cues from Fed officials during the week.
Wednesday during trading hours, the EIA said US crude oil inventories dipped 1.3 million barrels, while gasoline stocks added 0.10 million barrels in the weekended August 02. Analysts expected crude oil inventories to dip 2 million barrels and gasoline stocks to shed 1 million barrels last week.
This morning the U.S. dollar continued to linger near a 2-month low versus the euro, the Swiss franc, sterling and the yen.
In economic news from the euro zone, Germany's exports expanded 0.6 percent month-on-month in June, reversing last month's 2 percent fall, the Federal Statistical Office reported. Nonetheless, the rate of growth was weaker than the 0.9 percent rise forecast by economists. Meanwhile, imports fell 0.8 percent from a month ago, following a 1.4 percent rise. Economists had forecast imports to grow at a moderate pace of 0.5 percent in June.
Traders will look to the weekly jobless claims data from the US Labor Department due out at 8.30 a.m ET. Economists expect claims to have increased to 336,000 from 326,000 in the previous week
