2019.09.0606:26:00UTC+00Oil Prices Fall On Demand Concerns

Oil prices fell around 1 percent on Friday due to lingering demand-side concerns amid uncertainty around trade deal negotiations.

Benchmark Brent crude declined 0.9 percent to $60.41 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down 1.1 percent at $55.70 a barrel.

China and the United States on Thursday agreed to hold high-level talks in early October in Washington, though no date has been set for the meeting.

The last round of talks in July in Shanghai ended with no indication of progress.

Higher production in August by OPEC and Russia, and profit booking by traders after recent gains pushed down oil prices, as investors await the U.S. jobs report as well as remarks by Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell on the economy and monetary policy later in the day for more clues on the policy outlook.

Crude oil futures surrendered their entire early gains and settled flat on Thursday after the release of inventory data by the Energy Information Administration.

The report showed that crude inventories in the U.S. fell by 4.8 million barrels in the week ended August 30, nearly two times the expected fall.