Oil prices hovered below $77 a barrel Tuesday, the Associated Press reported. By early afternoon in Europe, benchmark crude for August delivery was down 18 cents to $76.36 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract rose 53 cents to settle at $76.54 on Monday. In other Nymex trading in August contracts, heating oil rose 0.26 cent to $2.0196 a gallon, gasoline gained 0.54 cent to $2.0644 a gallon and natural gas fell 1.9 cents to $4.491 per 1,000 cubic feet. Brent crude was down 10 cents to $75.52 a barrel on the ICE futures exchange.