Oil Prices Rise As Gasoline Futures Rally

SINGAPORE – Crude oil prices rose in Asian trading on Friday following a sharp rally in gasoline futures and fresh violence in Nigeria.

Light, sweet crude for April delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange increased 6 cents to $60.53 a barrel, midafternoon in Singapore. Gasoline rose 1.29 cents to $1.7330 a gallon while heating oil rose slipped fractionally to $1.7192 a gallon. Natural gas rose 4.9 cents to $6.650 per 1,000 cubic feet.

Brent crude futures on London’s ICE Futures exchange rose 4 cents to $61.10 a barrel.

On Thursday, gasoline futures staged a rally on expectations that gasoline inventories would be drawn down as refineries in the United States reduce output while undergoing spring maintenance.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported Wednesday that commercial gasoline stocks fell 1.1 million barrels to 224.8 million barrels last week as refiners lowered utilization by 2.2 percentage points to a relatively low 83 percent of operating capacity.

A Nigerian militant group holding three foreign oil workers hostage said its fighters clashed with army troops in the country’s oil-rich delta region.

The militants said in an e-mailed statement that one of their vessels was attacked Wednesday on the Escravos River by four Nigerian navy patrol boats, sparking a 45-minute gun battle they claimed left seven government soldiers dead.

The renewed violence damped hopes that Nigerian oil production can soon return to normal, analysts said.