Oil prices were steady near $119 a barrel Wednesday in Asia. Light, sweet crude for September delivery fell 1 cent to US$119.16 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange by midafternoon in Singapore. The contract dropped US$2.24 overnight to settle at US$119.17 a barrel. In London, September Brent crude was up 41 cents at US$118.41 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange, the Associated Press reported. Nymex front-month crude futures have fallen about US$28, or about 19 percent, since reaching a record high of US$147.27 on July 11. In other Nymex trading, heating oil futures rose 0.65 cent to US$3.2885 a gallon (3.8 liters) while gasoline prices fell 0.19 cent to US$2.9545 a gallon. Natural gas futures decreased 1.6 cents to US$8.71 per 1,000 cubic feet.
