Oil and metals prices fall on worries about demand outlook while major crops rise

New York: Oil and metals prices fell on Friday on worries about the demand outlook while some major crops rose, helping a key commodities index edge higher for the day.

For the week, the 19-commodity Thomson Reuters Jeffries CRB index also settled higher, helped by big rally across commodities on Thursday as the dollar slumped.

The US currency continued its trek lower in Friday?s session, hitting its lowest against the euro since April as the market continued to digest the European Central Bank?s decision on Thursday to hold off on an expected rate cut.

On Friday, oil prices fell in heavy trading, dragged by a drop in gasoline on expectations that a large number of European cargoes could hit US shores due to a seasonal slump in demand in West Africa.

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Copper closed lower on Friday as demand from top consumer China remained weak. A day earlier, the metal had hit a one-week high in European trading.

Gold fell on Friday too, after growing inflation pressure in China dented hopes for more stimulus from the world?s second-largest economy.

The CRB index managed to settle a touch higher, helped by gains of about 2 per cent or more in coffee, wheat and corn.

Natural gas was the outlier, rising more than 4 per cent, and closing up for a second day, backed by a bullish weekly report on inventories and colder forecasts for next week that could boost heating demand.

For the week, the CRB was up 0.9 per cent, almost identical to Thursday?s daily gain, as the ECB?s rate cut hold pushed the dollar sharply lower against the euro, boosting raw materials priced in the US currency.

Thursday?s run-up on the CRB was the largest daily increase so far this year.

Some traders have doubts about whether commodities will continue to rise in the near term, unless giant consumer China starts to issue consistently strong economic data.

While China?s export growth rebounded surprisingly sharply to a seven-month high in December, its copper imports declined 6.6 per cent from November. China is the world?s largest buyer of copper and other base metals.

?China spent much of last year accumulating stockpiles at attractive prices. Now a recovery is beginning to take place they have more than enough metal lying around,? said Nic Brown, head of commodities research at Natixis.

Copper, brent oil and gold down

Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange closed down 0.8 per cent at $8,045 a tonne.

In crude oil, London?s benchmark Brent settled down 1.1 per cent at $110.64 a barrel, retreating below its 100-day moving average of $111.05. Volume in Brent crude was 50 per cent above the 30-day norm, preliminary Thomson Reuters data showed.

US gasoline futures dropped 2 per cent, the biggest daily decline since early November, amid talk of large volumes of European gasoline headed to the New York Harbour, delivery point for US oil product futures, as fuel demand in West Africa declined seasonally.

In gold, the spot price of bullion slipped below its 200-day moving average, down 0.7 per cent to hover around $1,662 late Friday afternoon in New York.

On the grains side, front-month corn on the Chicago Board of Trade settled up 1.4 per cent at $7.083/4 a bushel ? after setting a three-week peak above $7.23 ? on tighter-than-expected supply projections from the US Department of Agriculture.

The USDA, in hotly anticipated crop reports, pegged the US corn stockpile at 8.03 billion bushels as of December 1. That was 3 per cent smaller than expected.

Wheat had its biggest daily gain since late November. The front-month futures contract on the CBOT also rose 1.4 per cent like corn to settle at $7.54-3.4 a bushel after a one-week week at $7.73.

Arabica coffee jumped more than 2 per cent to a one-month high in New York trading. The front-month contract settled up 3.70 cents, or 2.5 per cent, at $1.5335 per lb, with trading volumes more than double the 30-day average, according to Thomson Reuters data.

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