By William L. Watts, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Oil futures gained ground Wednesday ahead of the conclusion of a meeting of Federal Reserve policy makers and U.S. government data on crude inventories.
Nymex WTI crude for April delivery CLJ4 +0.31% advanced 50 cents, or 0.5%, to $100.20 a barrel. The contract closed Monday at its highest level since March 11, boosted after news reports said a pipeline expansion that would help draw down supplies at the Cushing, Okla., oil delivery hub would be completed sooner than had been expected.
WTI had initially seen some light profit-taking after the Tuesday rally, said Addison Armstrong, senior director for market research at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Conn.
The American Petroleum Institute late Tuesday said crude inventories rose 5.9 million barrels in the week ended March 14, more than double the 2.6 million barrels forecast by analysts surveyed by energy data provider Platts.
The more closely watched weekly inventories report from the Energy Information Administration is due Wednesday morning.
Europe’s benchmark crude fell, with ICE May Brent futures UK:LCOK4 -0.82% fell 64 cents, or 0.6%, to $106.15 a barrel.
“Brent is sagging on renewed concerns about China after the collapse of a property developer,” Armstrong said.
Zhejiang XingrungReal Estate, a provincial developer, collapsed this week , unable to repay almost $600 million of loans, according to The Wall Street Journal.
The Federal Reserve is expected to leave rates unchanged and continue scaling back the size of its bond-buying progrma when it concludes its two-day meeting Wednesday. Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen will hold her first news conference at 2:30 p.m. Wednesday.
In other energy trading, natural-gas futures NGJ14 -0.47% rose around 3 cents, or 0.6%, to $4.482 per million British thermal units.
