Oil prices extend pullback as Red Sea worries fade

Oil futures fell early Thursday as traders put worries over the potential for shipping disruptions in the Red Sea on the back burner and awaited official data on U.S. crude inventories after an industry report showed an unexpected rise in stocks.

Price action

• West Texas Intermediate crude
  CL00,
  -1.07%
  for February delivery
  CL.1,
  -1.07%

  CLG24,
  -1.07%
  fell 89 cents, or 1.2%, to $73.22 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

• February Brent crude
  BRNG24,
  -1.13%,
  the global benchmark, was down 93 cents or 1.2%, at $78.72 a barrel on ICE Futures Europe.

• Back on Nymex, January gasoline
  RBF24,
  -0.79%
  fell 1% to $2.134 a gallon, while January heating oil
  HOF24,
  -0.42%
  was off 0.6% at $2.609 a gallon.

• January natural gas
  NGF24
  was flat at $2.619 per million British thermal units.

Market drivers

Shipping company Maersk
MAERSK.A,
-0.17%

MAERSK.B,
-0.70%
on Wednesday said it had scheduled several dozen container ships to move via the Suez Canal and Red sea in coming days and weeks, news reports said. Maersk and other shippers had previously rerouted ships away from the area after a series of drone and missile attacks by Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen following the start of the Israel-Hamas war.