oil futures flipped between small gains and losses early thursday attempting to stabilize after backtoback losses that analysts blamed largely on a warning from federal reserve chair jerome powell this week that interest rates will need to rise higher and possibly faster than previously anticipated   west texas intermediate crude for april delivery cl1 cl00 clj23 rose 9 cents or 01 to 7675 a barrel on the new york mercantile exchange   may brent crude brn00 brnk23 was up 17 cents or 02 to 8283 a barrel on ice futures europe   back on nymex april gasoline rbj23 rose 01 to 2692 a gallon while april heating oil hoj23 was little changed at 2741 a gallon wti and brent crude were both down more than 35 so far this week after suffering backtoback losses as powell delivered two days of congressional testimony powell said interest rates would need to rise higher than previously anticipated and said an outsize half percentage point rise in the central bank’s policy rate rather than a quarter point move was a possibility if incoming economic data runs hot his comments treasury yields surging and lifted the us dollar to its highest since december a rising dollar can be a negative for commodities priced in the currency making them more expensive to users of other currencies “oil is once again snared in the fed rate hike loop” said stephen innes managing partner at spi asset management in a note “ at the start of the year oil prices and most risk assets were driven by a cooling us economy a resurgent china and a recovering europe these are ideal conditions for a commodity rally as a cooling us economy would allow for a fed pause leading to a weaker dollar and clearing a path for more robust chinese fundamentals to dominate commodity trading” he wrote “the subsequent rally in the dollar has hurt all the commodities and while we have reached a stalemate it is still too early to call checkmate” meanwhile it will be difficult for crude to find its footing until china’s economic data “lights up” or the fed turns less hawkish he said