Heating oil steady after day of losses

20 November 2009

Wholesale heating oil contracts trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange were relatively flat this morning (November 20th), with the market pausing after a sell-off in commodities yesterday.

A stronger dollar and weaker equities markets helped to drive down oil prices yesterday and heating oil suffered a concomitant drop.

Speaking to Reuters, Tony Nunan, an analyst at Mitsubishi Corp in Tokyo, said the market lacked direction and was faced by conflicting signs of economic performance.

"The economic outlook in the US is still very uncertain. We've probably seen the bottom but there are still a lot of storm clouds on the horizon," he reflected.

Although crude oil is still set for a moderate weekly gain, prices have been pegged back by a strengthened dollar.

The greenback has declined markedly this year as traders have moved out of the safe-haven currency and into higher-yielding assets such as the Brazilian real, Australian dollar and the South Korean won.

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