By Robert Daniel, MarketWatch
TEL AVIV (MarketWatch)—Crude-oil prices were moving between small gains and losses on Friday, as investors balanced a fresh report estimating weaker oil demand for this year against a weaker dollar and continued tension in the Middle East.
Crude oil for November delivery CLX2 -0.21% recently declined 2 cents a barrel to $92.05 a barrel.
On Thursday, crude-oil futures rose on continued tension in the Middle East, but they finished off session highs after the Energy Information Administration reported a slightly bigger-than-expected increase in U.S. oil supplies last week.
The dollar index, DXY -0.21% which measures the buck against a basket of six key rival currencies, on Friday was off 0.2% at 79.6. A weaker greenback makes dollar-denominated commodities cheaper for holders of other currencies.
The Syria-Turkey fighting—a spillover from Syria’s attempt to fight off a 19-month rebellion against the government of President Bashar al-Assad—has unnerved the market because conflicts could disrupt oil supplies.
IEA estimates
And the International Energy Agency in its monthly report cut its estimate of how much oil demand would grow in 2012 to 700,000 barrels a day from around 800,000. An increasingly gloomy economy is pressuring oil consumption world-wide.
For 2013, the IEA on Friday affirmed its view of global oil demand growth at 800,000 barrels a day.
And the report said that Western sanctions against Iran, designed to deter the country from developing nuclear weapons, are cutting into the nation’s production and exports. Read: IEA cuts 2012 oil demand growth forecast
In other markets, natural gas for November delivery NGX12 -0.53% slipped 1 cent to $3.59 per million British thermal units.
Heating oil for delivery that month HOX2 -0.82% gave back 2 cents, or 0.7%, to $3.23 a gallon.
And November gasoline RBX2 -1.73% fell 4 cents, or 1.4%, to $2.91 a gallon.
Robert Daniel is MarketWatch's Middle East bureau chief, based in Tel Aviv.
