NEW YORK, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- Oil prices continued to advance on Friday as the market was bolstered by signs of progress on U.S.-China trade talks and a tightening energy supply.
The West Texas Intermediate for March delivery increased 1.18 U.S. dollars to settle at 55.59 dollars a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, while Brent crude for April delivery rose 1.68 dollars to close at 66.25 dollars a barrel on the London ICE Futures Exchange. For the week, the U.S. benchmark prices were up 5.4 percent, and the Brent gained about 6.7 percent.
China and the United States held the sixth round of high-level economic and trade consultations in Beijing from Thursday to Friday.
Both sides reached consensus in principle on major issues and had specific discussions about a memorandum of understanding on bilateral economic and trade issues. They agreed that consultations will be continued in Washington next week.
The latest progress on U.S.-China trade talks helped to ease worries about energy demand, experts noted.
A slew of recent data showed further cuts of global output, also supporting the prices.
Global supply fell 1.4 million barrels per day (bpd) to 99.7 million bpd in January, said the monthly report on Wednesday by the International Energy Agency.
A separate report on Tuesday showed the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) significantly curbed its crude oil production. OPEC said that crude oil production decreased by 797,000 barrels a day in January to an average 30.81 million bpd.
