Markets

Crude prices mixed in Asian trade

SINGAPORE: Oil prices were mixed in Asia on Monday with downward pressure comeing from a slip in US industrial output,
Published February 18, 2013 Updated February 18, 2013 06:24am

 

New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in March eased 14 cents to $95.72 a barrel while Brent North Sea crude for delivery in April added 26 cents to $117.92.

 

Trading was restrained "after an unexpected dip in US industrial production spurred concerns about lagging economic activity", Phillip Futures said in a report.

 

Official data Friday showed industrial production in the United States -- the world's largest economy and oil consumer -- contracting 0.1 percent in January, with manufacturing output falling 0.4 percent.

 

"Economists had been expecting a modest increase in industrial output in January," Phillip Futures said.

 

Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2013