Crude oil prices down Tuesday

Crude oil prices slid on the New York Mercantile Exchange overnight as traders assessed the impact of an oil cartel’s production cuts.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries vowed to cut production by 4.2 million barrels per day in September. Several countries appear to be complying with the new quotas, but some traders need to see the evidence first.

Traders are hoarding oil now in the hope of a recovery in the price in perhaps one month’s time if OPEC has complied with production cuts, Mark Pervan at ANZ Bank told The Wall Street Journal.

OPEC has been notorious in the past for not complying with promised output cuts so there is a bit of caution, he said.

On Tuesday, crude oil prices fell $1.26 to $44.52 per barrel. Heating oil prices dropped 0.0215 cents to $1.4075 per gallon. Reformulated blendstock gasoline fell 0.0196 cents to $1.138 per gallon. Natural gas prices rose 0.037 cents to $4.53 per million British thermal units.

At the pump, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline was $1.84 Tuesday, down from Monday’s $1.842 a gallon, AAA said.