Heating oil prices stable with growing US demand

12 November 2009

Wholesale heating oil prices continued to hold steady during the Asian trading session this morning (November 12th) as the markets reacted to new figures showing growing demand for fuel in the US.

Heating oil prices closed marginally higher yesterday at around $2.055 (€1.37) a gallon on the New York Mercantile Exchange after the latest report from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) revealed a draw-down in petroleum product inventories last week.

Meanwhile, the continued weakness of the dollar also promoted buying activity among foreign investors. Dollar-based commodities such as crude oil and gold often rise as the greenback falls against other currencies as foreign traders flock to hard assets.

Yesterday, the dollar was trading near a 15-month low against a basket of currencies tracked by Reuters.

Speaking to the news agency, Mark Pervan, senior commodities analysts at ANZ, said that despite the improvement shown by the EIA, demand for crude remains weak.

"Certainly the market looks to be overly overbought and what's holding it up is the continuing weak dollar," he commented.

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