* Oil jumps $2 on better-than-expected GDP data
* OPEC says "willing to go further" to balance market
* Labour action in U.K., U.S. supports crude prices
(Updates prices, adds comment)
By Chris Baldwin
LONDON, Jan 30 (Reuters) - Oil futures rose $2 on Friday
after data showed the U.S. economy shrank less than expected in
the fourth quarter and after OPEC signalled it may again cut
production.
By 1420 GMT, U.S. crude was up $1.34 a barrel at $42.78,
after earlier touching $43.44, while London Brent crude had
gained $1.70 to $47.10.
"The rally got started on WTI (West Texas Intermediate) when
the GDP numbers were released," Olivier Jakob of consultants
Petromatrix said.
Data on Friday showed gross domestic product, which measures
total U.S goods and services output, fell 3.8 percent in the
fourth quarter, the steepest decline in nearly 27 years. But
this was better than the market's forecast for a 5.4 percent
contraction. []
Crude was also supported by strong RBOB gasoline and heating
oil futures as February refined products contracts approached
expiry, a possible workers strike at some U.S. refineries at the
weekend, and word that OPEC may act again to cut production.
The producer cartel's secretary general told Reuters it was
willing to cut output further at its meetings in March.
"If the market is unbalanced, yes we will take measures to
balance the market," the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting
Countries' Abdullah al-Badri said at the World Economic Forum in
Davos, Switzerland on Friday. []
The comments are a strong indication the Organization of the
Petroleum Exporting Countries, source of a third of the world's
oil, is willing to go further to stem oil's $100-a-barrel
collapse since June last year.
SHRINKING DEMAND
Oil has fallen nearly 11 percent over the past week but is
only down 6.8 percent from December, its smallest monthly
percentage fall since June 2008.
On Thursday oil fell 1.7 percent on data showing the U.S.
jobless rate rose to a record peak in January, single-family
home sales fell in December to their lowest ever and new orders
for durable goods tumbled for a fifth straight month.
Shrinking demand for fuel has also contributed to the
biggest four-month build-up in U.S. crude stockpiles since 1990.
Asia's outlook was equally bleak. Data showed Japan's
unemployment at a near three-year high and industrial output in
the world's third-biggest oil consumer plunging a record 10
percent last month [].
But traders said a possible strike by 30,000 U.S. refinery
workers who threatened on Thursday to shutter more than half of
the nation's oil refining capacity could support crude
[].
In Britain, energy workers staged unofficial walkouts on
Friday when anger over the use of foreign workers at an oil
refinery spread to other sites across the country.
Contractors at Total's <TOTF.PA> Lindsey refinery in eastern
England began a protest on Wednesday. The dispute spread on
Friday, and hundreds walked out at the Grangemouth oil refinery
in Scotland run by Ineos Group [].
Total and Ineos have both said production has not been
affected.
(Additional reporting by Farah Master; editing by Sue Thomas)
