By Ben Lefebvre Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES TOKYO (Dow Jones)--Crude-oil prices rose in Asia Friday as the market sought to restore stability to the price difference between West Texas Intermediate and Brent oils. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in May traded at $103.45 a barrel at 0540 GMT, up 67 cents in the Globex electronic session. May Brent crude on London's ICE Futures exchange rose 32 cents to $122.71 a barrel. Steep overnight drops in the price of WTI brought it more than $20 below Brent. That was a steeper discount than many in the market cared for, WHO commodity analyst Natalie Robertson said. "Brent/WTI is in oversold territory on a spread basis," Robertson said. Prices could continue their overall decline depending on a number of factors, including upcoming OPEC production data and stagnant gasoline demand in the U.S., Citi Futures energy analyst Tim Evans said. "While there have only been a few days of price weakness on what looks like quite moderate trading volumes so far, there are at least some risk factors that could drive a larger cycle of long liquidation," Evans said. Nymex reformulated gasoline blendstock for April--the benchmark gasoline contract--rose 69 points to $3.4075 a gallon, while April heating oil traded at $3.1700, 111 points lower. ICE gasoil for April changed hands at $1,013.25 a metric ton, down $10.75 cents from Thursday's settlement. -By Ben Lefebvre, Dow Jones Newswires; 813-6269-2813; ben.lefebvre@dowjones.com

Source