Heating oil tracks crude falls

27/02/2009

Wholesale heating oil prices have fallen during early trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex) this morning (February 26th) as crude contracts weaken.

By 4:16 Eastern Time, heating oil for March delivery was trading at $1.271 (89.57p) a gallon, down 2.3 cents on its opening price.

Meanwhile, headline Nymex crude contracts also dropped in early trade, with the commodity falling more than $1 to $44.18 a barrel.

The losses pare a week of gains made by both heating oil and crude on the back of stronger-than-anticipated demand data from the US Energy Department.

Yesterday, heating oil surged 5.64 cents over the course of the day.

However, early trading trimmed back these gains as weak economic signals surfaced in Tokyo.

Mark Pervan, a senior commodity strategist at Australia & New Zealand Banking Group, told Bloomberg: "You've got to keep an eye on the bigger picture and these key economic data are still disappointing."