Oil Futures Remain Near 2-Week Lows in Asia Trade

Oil futures remain near two-week lows in Asian trading Thursday, though Brent crude regained some ground by midday.

--November Nymex light, sweet crude oil on the New York Mercantile Exchange was recently down 5 cents at $49.93 a barrel in the Globex trading session. Brent was up 0.1% at $55.84, but still close to the previous day's lows.

--Oil is failing to find support despite upbeat U.S. data on last week's oil storage levels, with the Energy Information Administration reporting that crude stockpiles shrank by 6 million barrels, exceeding the 300,000 barrel decline analysts were expecting.

--The price weakness followed a surge in U.S. crude oil exports last week, reports of Libya restarting its largest oil field and concerns about compliance levels to an ongoing production cap led by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Winter season heating demand could possibly fire up oil prices again, says Gnanasekar Thiagarajan, director of Commtrendz Risk Management.

Write to Biman Mukherji at biman.mukherji@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 05, 2017 00:33 ET (04:33 GMT)