Oil Gains a Second Day as Industry Report Shows Supply Decline

June 9 (Bloomberg) -- Oil rose for a second day as confidence among U.S. small businesses rose and an industry- funded report showed a drop in the country’s crude supplies, bolstering optimism about the strength of the economic recovery.

Oil gained after the National Federation of Independent Business’s optimism index increased to 92.2 last month, the highest level since September 2008. The American Petroleum Institute said crude inventories dropped 4.54 million barrels last week. An Energy Information Administration report today will probably show that stockpiles fell 900,000 barrels, according to a Bloomberg News survey.

“There is some optimism with the macro data, especially in the U.S.,” Ben Westmore, a minerals and energy economist at National Australia Bank Ltd. in Melbourne, said by telephone “The last few weeks there’s been decent draws in the oil inventories in the U.S. and so the EIA data will be important to see if that trend continues.”

Crude oil for July delivery gained 48 cents, or 0.7 percent, to $72.47 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange at 10:09 a.m. in Sydney. Yesterday, the contract rose 55 cents, or 0.8 percent, to settle at $71.99.

Oil rose yesterday after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said that the improvement in the world’s largest energy-consuming country is “moderate paced.” The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index gained 1.1 percent following its biggest two- day slump since March 2009.

The Energy Department cut its oil price forecast for 2010 to an average $78.75 a barrel from $82.18 in its monthly Short- Term Energy Outlook, released yesterday. It reduced the outlook for oil consumption this year to 85.51 million barrels a day from 85.55 million last month.

Refinery Rates

U.S. refineries probably operated at 87.5 percent of capacity last week, unchanged from the previous week, according to the Bloomberg survey. Gasoline inventories fell 500,000 barrels from 219 million the week before.

Kuwaiti Oil Minister Ahmad Al-Sabah said yesterday that prices will probably average $70 for the rest of this year and that he considers current levels “acceptable.” Al-Sabah spoke to reporters in Kuwait’s parliament. Kuwait is OPEC’s third- largest oil producer after Saudi Arabia and Iran, based on Bloomberg estimates of May output.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries is scheduled to release its monthly market report today, and the Paris-based International Energy Agency is scheduled to publish its outlook tomorrow.

Brent crude for July delivery gained 18 cents, or 0.3 percent, to settle at $72.30 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange yesterday.