Oil tumbled Thursday August 18, 2011 on worries that pinched consumers will drive less and cut spending on gasoline.

Gasoline, which is made from crude oil, should follow oil downward in coming weeks.

The national average held steady on Thursday at $3.585 per gallon. If oil stays at current levels, gasoline should fall as low as $3.25 between mid-September and mid-October, said Tom Kloza, publisher and chief oil analyst at the Oil Price Information Service. Read more »

Crude oil prices should bounce back once global markets regain confidence after last week's startling downgrade of the United States' credit rating, the oil minister of OPEC-member Kuwait said on Sunday.

US light crude dived to a low of $82.87 a barrel, its lowest level since November 2010, after the world's largest economy lost its top-notch AAA credit rating from Standard & Poor's on Friday, before better-than-expected US jobs growth data drove a modest recovery to $86.88. Read more »

Crude prices showed a smart pullback on Wednesday August 10, 2011 and rose over 4 percent in the day supported by sharp pullback in the equities market and after a government report showed oil inventories fell last week. US crude stocks fell 5.2 million barrels last week, the US Energy Information Administration's said in its weekly inventory report. Distillate stocks fell 700,000 barrels and gasoline stockpiles fell 1.6 million barrels. Read more »

Oil dropped nearly 2 percent Friday August 5, 2011 as investors shrugged off U.S. job gains and focused on lingering concerns about the global economy.

Benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude for September delivery fell $1.70 to $84.93 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Prices pulled back from an early surge. A government report on Friday morning showed employers added 117,000 jobs in July. Unemployment fell slightly, to 9.1 percent. The news helped push crude as high as $88.32 before it tapped off. Read more »