•-Crude futures resumed their bull run early Thursday, reversing the falls on Wednesday following the release of generally bearish weekly US stock data. With little fresh news to direct the market, players were clutching onto the small draw in Cushing, Oklahoma crude stocks, as well as a technically driven rally as the end of the third quarter approaches, analysts said.

•At 09:56 GMT, Nov ICE Brent was up 68 cents to $78.11/barrel, with the NYMEX and ICE November WTI contracts up by 76 cents to $1.06/b. After the release of the US stocks data, the energy complex fell significantly, with NYMEX WTI losing around $2/b.

•According to the EIA, crude stocks rose by 1.8 million barrels, distillate stocks by 1.6 million barrels and gasoline stocks by 600,000 barrels. However, prices soon recovered and WTI futures actually closed higher than Tuesday's settle.

•The "fundamental underpinning" seems to have come from the 200,000 barrel draw in Cushing, Oklahoma stocks, home of the NYMEX delivery point. Despite the draw being small, current stock levels are around a 21-month low and market players saw this as an incentive to buy the spreads, pushing prices higher.

Updated: September 27, 2007