Heating oil little changed, demand weighs

15 February 2010

Written by Bob Burton

Heating oil prices recovered from early losses this morning (February 15th) to register marginal gains on its price at the close of trading last week, while crude prices were also flat during early trading.

As European markets opened, the headline heating oil contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange was trading around $1.918 (€1.40) a gallon, down a fraction of a cent on Friday's closing price.

The announcement that China is continuing to impede lending growth weighed heavily on the commodity during the Asian trading session, while investors also drew caution from a report from the Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Published on Friday last week, delayed by two days due to heavy snowfall in the US, the EIA data showed a further increase in crude inventories, pointing to further weakness in demand for energy products.

The cold snap has failed to raise demand for heating oil and propane substantially, the data also showed.

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