Investing.com - Oil prices fell on Thursday as growing pessimism over a deal between major producers to rein in oversupply and a larger than expected U.S. inventory build weighed on prices.
Crude oil for May delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange was down 42 cents, or 1.06%, to trade at $41.35 a barrel by 0849 GMT.
Global benchmark Brent was down 50 cents or 1.11% to $43.70 on the ICE Futures Europe exchange.
Oil prices have fallen after hitting 2016 highs earlier in the week amid growing skepticism that a meeting of major producers in Doha on Sunday will result in an agreement to freeze output or that it will have a meaningful impact.
The meeting will include both members and nonmembers of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.
Russian oil minister Alexander Novak has said any deal will be loosely-framed with few detailed commitments.
Iran has said it won’t participate in an output freeze until its output levels return to where they were before international sanctions were imposed.
The International Energy Agency warned Thursday that a deal is likely to have a limited impact on global supply and markets are unlikely to rebalance before 2017.
Oil prices also remained under pressure following data on Wednesday showing a larger than expected increase in U.S. crude stockpiles.
The Energy Information Administration reported that U.S. crude inventories increased by 6.6 million barrels in the latest week, bringing total crude stocks to a new record high of 536 million barrels.
Analysts had expected a storage build of 1.85 million barrels.
The figures came a day after industry group the American Petroleum Institute said U.S. crude stocks rose by 6.2 million barrels to 536.3 million last week, against expectations of a 1.9 million barrel increase.
OPEC cut its forecast for global oil demand growth in 2016 on Wednesday and warned of further reductions, pointing to a larger supply surplus this year.