Oil Falls Below $70 a Barrel
Oil prices continued their recent downturn, falling to below $70 a barrel and marking the lowest level in more than a year as worldwide demand continued to contract in the face of economic uncertainty, news services reported.
Benchmark light sweet crude futures fell to less than half their record high of $145.18 set on July 14, closing Thursday at $69.85 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the Wall Street Journal reported.
U.S. demand has fallen as much as 9% from a year ago due to the economic downturns led by recent stock market drop and other uncertainties, the Journal said in a front-page story Friday.
Gasoline and diesel prices have followed oil’s suit in the past months, with diesel falling 21.6 cents to $3.659 a gallon Monday in its biggest drop since the 2005 hurricanes, while gasoline saw its biggest single-week drop on record, plunging 33.3 cents to $3.151.
With one exception each, both fuels have fallen steadily since July, when diesel set a record $4.764 and gasoline set its all-time high of $4.114, according to Department of Energy figures.
