Oil mixed in Asian trade

SINGAPORE – Oil was mixed in Asian trade Friday, with data showing stronger US energy demand helping to perk up prices, analysts said.

New York’s main contract, West Texas Intermediate for August delivery, rose six cents to $98.73 a barrel, while Brent North Sea crude for August was down 41 cents to $118.18.

“Brent is slightly down as it is in consolidation phase after a strong rally,” said Serene Lim, an oil and gas analyst at ANZ Bank in Singapore.

“However, the tone is rather positive as the US Department of Energy (DoE) data was very positive.”

The DoE said gasoline (petrol) reserves fell 600,000 barrels in the week ending July 1.

That confounded expectations for a gain of 200,000 barrels, and indicated stronger demand as prices fell and summer vacations began in the world’s biggest oil-consuming nation.

Crude inventories, however, were down 900,000 barrels last week, well short of forecasts for a 2.4-million-barrel drop.

“Though crude oil stockpiles fell less than expected, overall, coupled with other refined products, it was still a very bullish set of DoE data,” Lim added.

Crude prices were also boosted by US jobs numbers and encouraging retail sales figures.

Payrolls firm ADP said that private businesses added 157,000 jobs in June, a solid jump after the weak 36,000 job increase in May.

The ADP figures encouraged sharply higher revisions of forecasts for Friday’s much-awaited US non-farm payrolls (NFP) data for June.

Markets worldwide are closely watching the health of the US economy, the biggest in the world, because it is a major engine for global growth.