•Global crude futures drifted lower Tuesday amid quiet trading, in what is becoming a typical start to a trading session, brokers said. Strong resistance levels and a spate of refinery glitches negated the International Energy Agency's report warning of increasing tightness on world oil markets over the next five years. "You see this more and more--the session starts by drifting lower with not much volume going through," a London-based broker said.

•On Monday the IEA released warned in its 2007 Medium-Term Oil Market Report that it saw world oil markets becoming increasingly tight beyond 2010, "with OPEC spare capacity declining to minimal levels by 2012." The report projects that OPEC spare capacity could be as low as 1.55 million b/d in 2012. This in turn pushed prices higher, traders said, with front-month ICE Brent hitting an intra day high of $76.34/b, a level not seen since August 10, 2006.

Updated: July 10, 2007