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NEW YORK: Oil prices fell for the seventh straight session on Tuesday amid market concerns that the US economic recovery could stall.
New York's main contract, light sweet crude for August delivery, reversed early gains to end 16 cents lower at 71.98 dollars.
In the first day of trading after a long holiday weekend, the contract hit an intra-day high of 73.86 dollars before succumbing to selling pressure.
London's Brent North Sea crude for August dipped two cents to 71.45 dollars.
Investors appeared concerned about a steeper-than-expected fall in a key index gauging the strength of the vast American services sector.
The Institute of Supply Management said early Tuesday that its non-manufacturing index declined to 53.8 points from 55.4 in May.
Most economists had expected the June figure to be at 55.0 after relatively steady readings in the prior three months.
Any number above 50 percent indicates growth in the sector that accounts for more than two-thirds of economic activity in the United States, the world's biggest energy consumer.
However, business activity and employment components of the index declined as new orders slumped for the third month in a row.
"It looks like the market just gave way," said analyst Jason Schenker at Prestige Economics.
"Some of the ISM data may have provided the incentive to proceed lower, but the reaction was so delayed."
Oil prices tumbled by more than eight percent last week as weak US economic data sparked fears about the strength of the global recovery.
The US economy shed 125,000 jobs in June, official data showed on Friday.
Elsewhere on Tuesday, China signed a deal to build an eight-billion-dollar refinery in Nigeria, a government official, in a fresh example of Beijing's aggressive investment in Africa.
- AFP/de
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