* Oil slides under $45 after 6 pct gain overnight
* CFTC investigating United States Oil Fund LP
* Market eyes Q4 U.S. GDP
* NYMEX March RBOB jumps after drop in gasoline stocks
(Updates prices, adds U.S. CFTC investigation, comment)
By Chris Baldwin
LONDON, Feb 27 (Reuters) - Oil fell back on Friday from its
three-day bull run, paring around 3 percent in early trade, but
otherwise remaining on course to end the month up 5 percent from
January, its first monthly gain since June.
OPEC output cuts and a bounce in U.S. demand for gasoline
this week pushed oil prices up, and analysts at JP Morgan said
tight supply meant "the crude market is finally in balance."
U.S. crude for April delivery <CLc1> was down $1.32 to
$43.90 a barrel by 1200 after closing at $45.22 on Thursday, a
$2.72 jump. London Brent crude <LCOc1> fell 94 cents to $45.57.
Analyst Oliver Jakob at Petromatrix said Friday's backslide
was in large part attributable to the U.S. Commodity Futures
Trading Commission's investigation of a crude oil trade earlier
this month by the United States Oil Fund LP on the New York
Mercantile Exchange. []
"The CFTC's investigation of US Oil Fund could put pressure
on WTI because the positions it had in the market were very
large. It was a late development yesterday that figured after
the market was already closed," Jakob said.
A steep 3.4 million barrel drawdown in U.S. gasoline stocks
announced earlier in the week sparked the rally that has lifted
crude prices 13 percent in this week alone. NYMEX March RBOB
registered its highest front-month settlement since November.
"With the impact of OPEC production cuts clearly being felt
in the markets, we anticipate continued bullishness in the
coming week with refinery runs expected to rise sharply,
resulting in a crude draw," JP Morgan analysts wrote in their
Global Energy Strategy note.
OPEC COMPLIANCE
OPEC has been implementing a 5 percent reduction in its
share of global production since September, totalling 4.2
million barrels per day, in order to support falling oil prices.
Oil touched a record high of $147.27 in July, and in the
course of six months fell more than $100 to $32.49 in December
as the global economy shuddered into a rapid and deep recession.
Signs of recovery have been lacking, with leading
industrialised and developing countries releasing economic data
regularly that show slumping consumer demand, rising
unemployment and frozen credit liquidity.
Geneva-based consultants Petrologistics, which tracks OPEC
supply, earlier this week said the Organization of the Petroleum
Exporting Countries are on schedule to deliver 89 percent
compliance with the production cuts by the end of February.
OPEC members continue to mull the possibility of another
output cut at its meeting in March, with the United Arab
Emirates cutting allocations for Asian refiners in April.
Venezuela said it wanted OPEC to agree on a new oil output
cut, but relatively small member Ecuador said oil prices were
stabilising now, brushing off possibility it might urge a cut.
Market players are closely eyeing March heating oil and RBOB
gasoline contracts that expire on Friday as well as key economic
data, including euro zone January inflation and unemployment
figures and U.S. fourth-quarter GDP.
The U.S. GDP figures, due at 1330 GMT, are expected to show
the world's largest economy had contracted at a 5.4 percent
annual rate, the deepest slide since the first quarter of 1982.
U.S. durable goods orders, an important gauge of business
activity, fell for a sixth month to a six-year low in January,
suggesting that dried-up credit markets have had a severe impact
on industries around the world.
(Additional reporting by Angela Moon in Seoul; editing by James
Jukwey)
