“Oil fell in New York and headed for the first weekly decline in four after Saudi Arabia denied a reported pipeline explosion in its Eastern province.
Futures slid as much as 0.9 percent after climbing to the highest price in 10 months yesterday. There was no sabotage at oil facilities in the Qatif area, according to Major General Mansour Al-Turki, a spokesman for the Saudi Arabian Interior Ministry. Prices rose above $110 a barrel for the first time since May after Iran’s Press TV said an explosion hit pipelines in the area, home to Saudi Arabia’s largest refinery.
“The report of the pipeline fire seems to have been a very successful scam by the Iranians,” said Filip Petersson, commodity strategist at SEB AB in Stockholm. “They want higher oil prices to compensate for lost export barrels and are obviously using various means to achieve it. The success clearly shows how nervous the market is.”
Oil for April delivery dropped as much as 98 cents to $107.86 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange and was at $108.24 at 11:45 a.m. London time. The contract closed up $1.77 at $108.84 yesterday, after rising as high as $110.55. Prices are down 1.4 percent this week and up 5.9 percent from a year ago.
Brent oil for April settlement slipped $1.08, or 0.9 percent, to $125.12 on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange after falling as much as 1.3 percent earlier. It surged as much as 4.7 percent to $128.40 yesterday, the highest price since July 2008, the month Brent reached a record $147.50. The European benchmark contract’s premium to West Texas Intermediate was at $16.87 a barrel today….”
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