By Claudia Assis and Nick Godt, MarketWatch
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Crude-oil futures rose on Thursday, receiving boosts from a drop in U.S. jobless claims, a slightly upward revision to second-quarter growth, and news that manufacturing in the Chicago area rose.
Crude oil for November delivery (CLX10 79.38, +1.52, +1.95%) gained $1.30, or 1.7%, to $79.14 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Oil added to gains after news that the Chicago PMI rose to 60.4% in September, from 56.7% in August. Analysts surveyed by MarketWatch had expected a drop to 55%. Read more on Chicago PMI.
Earlier, crude-oil futures had reacted favorably to news that the Labor Department said U.S. jobless claims fell 16,000 to 453,000 in the week ended Sept. 25. Economists polled by MarketWatch had expected a rise to 460,000. Read more on jobless claims.
And U.S. growth was revised to 1.7% for the second quarter, compared with an earlier estimate of 1.6%. This still represented a sharp slowdown from growth of 3.7% in the first quarter.Read more on GDP revision.
On Wednesday, crude oil rallied more than 2% after a U.S. government report showed an unexpected drop in crude-oil inventories, which fell 500,000 barrels. In addition, gasoline reserves decreased 3.5 million barrels.
Other factors are at play to support commodities recently, according to Mike Fitzpatrick, oil analyst at MF Global.
The recent rally is “either a search for higher yield, which is a function of rising risk appetite, or the appreciation of hard assets as a consequence of mistrust of financials,” he wrote in a note.
Energy traders are waiting for inventories data for natural gas. The Department of Energy’s Energy Information Administration reports on storage levels at 10:30 a.m. Eastern.
Analysts surveyed by Platts expect an increase of 67 billion to 71 billion cubic feet for the week ended Sept. 24, compared with 65 billion cubic feet for the comparable week in 2009 and a five-year average of 67 billion cubic feet.
Natural gas for November delivery (NGX10 3.89, -0.07, -1.84%) retreated 8 cents, or 2%, to $3.88 per million British thermal units.
