Crude Oil Falls Below $70 As Job Losses Mount

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Crude oil dropped below $70 per barrel on Friday as a disappointing jobs led to worries over energy demand. Despite the loss, oil finished the week up about 6%.

Light sweet crude oil for November delivery dropped to $69.95 per barrel, down 87 cents on the session. Prices hit as low as $68.74 after earlier reaching as high as $70.90.

For the week, oil gained $3.53 per barrel, This comes after oil fell 8.4% last week, the largest one-week drop in two months.

The Labor Department said non-farm payrolls dropped 263,000 in September, larger than the expected decline of 170,000 jobs. The unemployment rate for September rose to 9.8%.

Later in the morning, the U.S. Commerce Department said factory orders declined 0.8 percent in August. This followed a 1.4 percent advance in July and a 0.9 percent rise in June.

Earlier in the week, the Energy Information Administration reported crude oil inventories increased 2.8 million barrels in the week ending September 25. Analysts had forecast a jump of 2.1 million barrels.

(Market News Provided by RTTNews)