Crude oil prices are modestly higher Wednesday morning, ahead of official inventory data and some crucial U.S. economic reports.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration will release crude inventory data for the week ended November 29th at 10:30 am ET.
Data released by the American Petroleum Institute late Tuesday, showed U.S. crude stockpiles to have declined by 6.5 million barrels last week.
Crude oi futures for January delivery are up $0.14 or 0.20 percent at $67.02 a barrel.
Lingering concerns about excess supply and a stronger dollar are limiting oil's gains.
On Tuesday, crude oil futures ended down $2.12 or 3.1 percent at $66.88 a barrel, not far off a 5-1/2 year low of $63.72 on Monday.
A stronger dolar and reports that OPEC pumped 30.56 million barrels a day in November, exceeding its official target for a sixth straight month weighed on oil.
Meanwhile, natural gas for January is down $0.057 or 1.47 percent at $3.817 per million btu.
At 8:15 am ET, ADP will release its private sector payrolls report for November. The Labor Department will release its final third quarter productivity and costs report at 8:30 am ET.
At 9:45 am ET, Markit will come out with the final estimates of its U.S. non-farm manufacturing index for November. And, finally, the Institute for Supply Management is scheduled to release the results of its service sector survey at 10 am ET.
The markets also await a few speeches from Fed officials. Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank President Charles Plosser will speak on the economic outlook in Charlotte, North Carolina at 12:30 pm ET.
Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard will speak in Washington at 2 pm ET and later in the day, at 7:30 pm ET, Dallas Federal Reserve Bank President Richard Fisher will speak in Dallas.
