Heating oil makes marginal gains

18/06/2009

There have been fractional gains seen in near-term heating oil contracts trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange this morning (June 18th).

At 05:44 Eastern Time, the July delivery heating oil contract was trading at $1.8723 ($1.15) a gallon, up one-ninth of a cent on yesterday's settle price.

Stronger gains were made yesterday after an announcement from the Energy Information Administration showing a smaller than expected rise in heating oil stocks in the US last week.

Crude oil prices also rose after an unexpectedly large drop in oil stocks, while prices have also been pushed up this morning by growing concerns about supply disruptions in Nigeria.

Militants opposed to foreign oil companies working in the country have claimed that they have destroyed a major pipeline owned by Royal Dutch Shell, causing traders to fear that production will be constricted further.

Speaking to Bloomberg, Toby Hassall, an analyst with Commodity Warrants Australia Ltd, said: "If there is a significant enough disruption that could flow through to the fundamentals and support the price."