Oil steadies as COVID-19-induced demand worries persist | Reuters

Oil steadies as COVID-19-induced demand worries persist | Reuters

Oil steadied on Thursday after early declines fuelled by delays to vaccine rollouts and fresh travel curbs to prevent new coronavirus outbreaks.

Brent crude futures were up 8 cents, or 0.1%, at $55.89 a barrel by 1331 GMT, having hit a session low of $55.31.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down 8 cents, or 0.2%, at $52.77 after dropping as low as $52.22.

Oil prices were supported by data on Wednesday showing a huge 10 million barrel decline in U.S. crude inventories last week, which analysts said was because of a pick-up in U.S. crude exports and a drop in imports.