“Oil slid from the highest level in a week as U.S. lawmakers disagreed on steps to avert automatic spending cuts and tax increases that take effect on Jan. 1 and threaten to curb economic growth and fuel demand.
Futures dropped as much as 0.6 percent in London after rising the most in three weeks yesterday on a plan by the Federal Reserve to expand its monetary stimulus. Republicans have “some serious differences” with President Barack Obama’s budget proposals, House Speaker John Boehner told reporters in Washington. The Fed’s bond purchases can’t offset full effects of the so-called fiscal cliff, Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said.
“Market participants are jittery over the fiscal cliff even though experience shows that agreement won’t come until five minutes before the deadline,” Thorbjorn Bak Jensen, an oil market analyst at Global Risk Management in Middelfart, Denmark, said by telephone. “The Fed is printing money, and a lot of it is already priced in.”
Brent for January settlement on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange declined as much as 65 cents to $108.85 a barrel and was at $108.97 at 12:49 p.m. London time. It climbed 1.4 percent yesterday, or $1.49 a barrel, the most since Nov. 19. The European benchmark crude has advanced 1.5 percent this year.
West Texas Intermediate crude for January delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 60 cents to $86.17 a barrel in electronic trading. The contract advanced 98 cents to $86.77 yesterday, the highest close since Dec. 5. New York-traded WTI has declined 13 percent in the year.
Brent was at a premium of $22.83 to WTI.”
If you enjoy the content at iBankCoin, please follow us on Twitter
