Kuwait crude price loses 13 cents to stand at $99.76 pb

Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) said on Thursday that the price of Kuwait's crude oil slipped by 13 cents in Wednesday's trading to settle at USD 99.76 per barrel (pb) compared with USD 99.89 a day earlier. The prices of crude oil in the international markets slightly declined after the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) had lowered its international economic growth expectations for this year and 2014 as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has also reduced its Chinese economic growth expectation in 2013 to reach 7.75 percent. The forecast affected world oil prices, which raised fears of demand for energy sources such as crude oil in time when the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported an increase in US crude reserves worth of 4 million barrels as opposed to the expectations of analysts that predicted a decline in the reserves level by 1.5 million barrels. The crude oil futures opened on Wednesday in the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) at USD 92.89 pb to trade at USD 92.96 pb, hitting the highest level of USD 93.02 pb and the lowest of USD 92.72 pb.