Oil prices drop

Oil fell more than 1 percent on Wednesday as the dollar strengthened in early Asian trade, while an industry report showing a larger-than-expected rise in US crude inventories also dragged on prices.
Crude futures settled up more than 2 percent on Tuesday when the dollar index posted its biggest fall since early October amid soft US data that cast doubts about the underlying optimism on the outlook for the world’s biggest economy.
“The key driver for oil prices in the last few days has been currency fluctuations ... we had seen some weakness in the US dollar which help support prices overnight,” Ric Spooner, chief analyst at CMC Markets in Sydney said.
“Oil eased a little bit in the Asian time zone, possibly reflecting the fact that the dollar is a little bit stronger.”
Brent crude LCOc1 hit a low of $48.79 a barrel and was down 60 cents at $49.00 by 0507 GMT. US crude CLc1 was at $45.53 a barrel, down 70 cents, after earlier hitting $45.33.