* First storm of Atlantic hurricane season may be developing
* Coming Up: Group of 20 meeting at the weekend
* For a technical view, click: [
]
(Update prices, adds oil price poll, BP share price fall)
By Ikuko Kurahone
LONDON, June 25 (Reuters) - Crude slipped on Friday, mainly depressed by ample supply but underpinned by a Caribbean storm which might move towards the Gulf of Mexico, where oil facilities are clustered and BP continues to fight an oil spill.
Worries about the fragility of global economic recovery ahead of a summit of Group of 20 nations was additionally weighing on prices and overshadowing global markets.
By 1046 GMT, U.S. crude futures <CLc1> fell 14 cents to $76.37 a barrel, heading for the first weekly decline in three weeks. Brent crude futures <LCOc1> fell 39 cents to $76.08.
"Two topics are dominating today. One is a hurricane may be forming now, which is supportive to the market. And we have a looming problem of very high inventories worldwide, which offsets the support and is putting prices in a very tight range," said Andy Sommer, energy market analyst with EGL in Switzerland.
"The market is of course watching the G20 meeting and the Chinese yuan situation."
Ahead of the G20 summit, MSCI's all-country world index <.MIWD00000PUS> fell and European shares turned negative, having opened slightly higher. [
][ ]The dollar made little headway. [
]Oil prices have fallen from about $87 in early May amid the eurozone economic concerns triggered by Greece's sovereign debt crisis and ample supplies.
U.S crude oil is expected to average $79.86 a barrel in 2010, a Reuters poll showed, a slight drop from May's survey and the second consecutive lower monthly forecast after more than a year of rising expectations. [
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SEASON'S FIRST STORM
In the United States, the world's top oil market, crude oil and product inventories remain much higher than a year earlier levels. [
]High inventory levels can provide a cushion to reduce price spikes should bad weather cause supply disruptions. This was the case when deadly hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the U.S. Gulf of Mexico in 2005.
To kick off the Atlantic hurricane season, a tropical system over the western Caribbean has a high chance of developing into a tropical depression over the next couple of days as it moves toward the oil-rich Gulf of Mexico, the U.S. National Hurricane Center and other weather forecasters said on Thursday.
All weather models project the system will cross Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula over the next few days. After that, most forecasts still expect the wave to turn northwest and hit land near the Texas-Mexico border.
But some models now expect the wave to turn northeast toward Florida and the eastern Gulf of Mexico close to where BP Plc <BP.L> is trying to clean up its massive oil spill.
Shares in the British oil major hit a 14 year low on Friday morning. [
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For graphics U.S. Gulf of Mexico offshore crude output: http://graphics.thomsonreuters.com/10/US_OFSHRD0610.gif
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ (Additional reporting by Alejandro Barbajosa in Singapore; editing by Keiron Henderson and James Jukwey)