Oil and gasoline futures traded in narrow ranges on Friday, supported by concerns about tight supplies but pressured by a weak employment report, according to AP. The concerns are driven by Thursday's Energy Department inventory report, which said supplies of both crude oil and gasoline fell last week. Investors, meanwhile, expect that OPEC will keep output steady at a long-awaited meeting next week. Undermining prices, however, was Friday's Labor Department report that employers cut payrolls by 4,000 in August, the first drop in four years. Analysts had expected payrolls to grow by 110,000 jobs. That news has energy investors worried that credit tightness resulting from problems in the subprime mortgage industry is spreading to other sectors, which could cut demand for oil and gasoline. «Oil markets remain focused on a potential downdraft in demand,» said Linda Rafield, senior oil analyst at Platts, the energy research arm of McGraw-Hill Cos. Light, sweet crude for October delivery fell 3 cents to $76.27 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, while October gasoline fell 0.12 cent to $1.9705 a gallon. Both contracts fluctuated frequently between gains and losses. In London, October Brent crude fell 12 cents to $74.65 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange. Thursday's inventory report was not uniformly bullish. Refinery activity jumped much more than expected, leading many traders to reason that gasoline supplies will grow. The conflicting information left some investors confused. That caused some of Friday's price volatility, said Jim Ritterbusch, president of Ritterbusch & Associates in Galena, Illinois. «Now, they're trying to make up their minds whether they want to keep their positions or sell and run,» Ritterbusch said.
