Crude oil prices fell for a fourth straight day Friday, closing below 43 dollars per barrel for the first time in about three months.

On the New York Mercantile Exchange, crude oil for January delivery fell 71 cents to end at 42.54 dollars a barrel, while on London's International Petroleum Exchange the January Brent crude-oil futures contract shed 79 cents to settle at 39.36 dollars per barrel.

After US Energy Department issued the positive crude and heating oil supply report Wednesday, market sentiment about the supply-demand fundamentals shifted most dramatically. The selling then fed on itself due to technical and speculative trading.

"The scare is over and that just means the market is going back to where it belongs," an analyst said in New York. "We are more than well supplied and by that I mean there are not enough buyers for the product that's out there, for a while." he added.

However, many analysts said a lot would depend on where prices to between now and next Friday. If US government data scheduled tobe released Wednesday showed another increase in crude and heating oil, that could trigger more selling.

Crude oil prices were currently 37 percent higher than a year ago, putting the greatest financial pressure on low-income American families, chemical manufacturers and the airline industry.

Source: Xinhua