Oil prices hovered below $79 a barrel Wednesday in Asia, the Associated Press reported. Benchmark crude for April delivery was up 6 cents to $78.92 a barrel at late afternoon Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract lost $1.45 to settle at $78.86 on Tuesday. In other Nymex trading in March contracts, heating oil gained 0.64 cent to $2.0389 a gallon, and gasoline rose 0.23 cent to $2.0679 a gallon. Natural gas was steady at $4.779 per 1,000 cubic feet. In London, Brent crude was up 4 cents at $77.29 on the ICE futures exchange.
