* Oil tracks Wall Street stocks
* Losses pared on possibility of U.S. government auto aid
* Goldman Sachs says oil could hit $30 a barrel
(Updates prices at settlement)
By Edward McAllister
NEW YORK, Dec 12 (Reuters) - Oil prices settled nearly $2
lower on Friday after the collapse of a $14 billion rescue plan
for U.S. automakers kept Wall Street and oil markets volatile.
U.S. crude oil <CLc1> settled down $1.70 at $46.28 a
barrel, after falling below $44 earlier. London Brent crude
<LCOc1> settled down 98 cents at $46.41 a barrel.
Oil recovered from earlier lows as U.S. stocks pared losses
on the possibility that the White House or U.S. Treasury might
come through with an aid package for the automakers, after the
Senate failed to approve a $14 billion plan late Thursday.
[]
Oil has fallen from record highs above $147 a barrel in
July as the global economic crisis dents demand in large
consumer nations.
U.S. bank Goldman Sachs on Friday predicted oil could drop
as low as $30 as the credit crunch puts a strangle-hold on the
world economy. []
"The auto bailout plan dying in the Senate is weighing on
all markets," said Tom Bentz, an analyst at BNP Paribas
Commodity Futures Inc. "Yesterday's late pullback is looking
like another failure on the upside."
The plight of Detroit's Big Three U.S. automakers --
General Motors, Chrysler and Ford -- illustrates the severity
of the global economic downturn that has hit demand for oil.
U.S. Department of Transportation figures showed U.S.
motorists drove 9 billion fewer miles in October than a year
earlier, down 3.5 percent. []
Sales at U.S. retailers fell for a fifth straight month in
November -- the longest decline in at least 16 years -- as
consumers tightened belts during the credit squeeze.
"The collapse in world oil demand in the fourth quarter of
2008 as the global credit crunch intensified now threatens to
push oil prices below $40 a barrel in the near term," Goldman
Sachs said in a research note.
"The impact of the global economic recession has swung the
oil market from pricing demand destruction in 2008 to pricing
supply destruction in 2009," it added.
OPEC MULLS MORE SUPPLY CUTS
Goldman Sachs, which earlier this year had predicted $200
per barrel oil, virtually halved its 2009 price forecast for
U.S. crude to $45 a barrel and said the price could fall to $30
in the short term, hitting a trough in the first quarter.
The bank said a cut of an extra 2 million barrels per day
by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries was
needed. The producer group meets next Wednesday in Algeria.
French bank BNP Paribas cut its 2009 price forecast to $53
a barrel from $75. []
OPEC President Chakib Khelil has called for more "severe"
supply cuts at next week's meeting. []
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the country was
ready to work with OPEC on possible oil output cuts.
[]
Japan's Nippon Oil said it expected OPEC to agree to cut
1.5 million to 2 million bpd next week.
(Additional reporting by Jane Merriman in London, Jennifer Tan
in Singapore and Osamu Tsukimori in Tokyo; Editing by David
Gregorio)
