Oil up on drop in U.S. crude stockpiles, Middle East tensions

Oil prices ended in positive territory on Monday after a drop in stockpiles at the delivery point for U.S. crude in the second half of last week outweighed pressure from near record high production in Saudi Arabia. Tensions after the dispatch of U.S. Navy ships to waters near Yemen and an alert issued by Saudi Arabia for a possible militant attack also put a floor beneath U.K. North Sea Brent and U.S. crude prices, traders said.. "There were certainly competing influences, with the U.S. crude draw inspiring the bulls, while the bears pounced on the record high Saudi output," said John Kilduff, partner at New York energy hedge fund Again Capital. Oil services firm Genscape reported a drop of more 900,000 barrels at the Cushing, Oklahoma delivery point for U.S. crude between Tuesday and Friday last week, market sources who saw the data said.

via Business News http://ift.tt/1yJzYWu