Oil prices eased this morning after US government data showed motor-fuel demand weakening.
The data also showed that domestic inventories of gasoline shrank for the eighth consecutive week, and that may have moderated the selling, analysts said.
Light, sweet crude for June delivery fell 20 cents to $71.73 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract settled Wednesday at $71.93, a decline of 95 cents.
Fuel futures dropped 1.35 cents to $2.12 a gallon, while heating oil prices fell 0.29 cent to $2.02 a gallon.
The US Energy Department said gasoline demand was up 0.3 per cent over the past four weeks compared with the same period in 2005. But at this time last year, demand for the four-week period had risen 1.5 per cent compared with the same period in 2004.
The average retail price of gasoline in the United States is now $2.91 a gallon, or 68 cents higher than a year ago.
Despite the recent declines, oil prices remain about a third higher than a year ago because of supply disruptions, geopolitical tensions and the scant surplus production capacity available to the industry in the event of a major output hiccup. Analysts also said they expect global energy demand to remain strong.
Most prominent among supply disruptions, Nigeria is producing some 450,000 fewer barrels per day because of violence in the region. On the geopolitical side, the West's effort to contain Iran's nuclear ambitions is the top concern.