oil futures continued to slide on thursday as concerns about chinese demand and rising inventories weighed on prices bringing losses for the us crude benchmark to nearly 8 for the week so far   west texas intermediate crude for december delivery cl1 cl00 fell 57 cents or 07 to 8519 a barrel on the new york mercantile exchange bringing its weektodate decline to nearly 8 according to factset   january brent crude brnf23 the global benchmark lost 54 cents or 06 to 8937 a barrel on ice futures europe   back on nymex december gasoline rbz22 prices rose 05 to 256 a gallon while december heating oil hoz22 fell 12 to 361   december natural gas ngz22 rose marginally to 587 per million british thermal units extending its losses for the second day in a row crude prices have suffered this week as an increase in covid19 cases in china has dampened hopes for a relaxation of beijing’s “zero covid” policy of lockdown restrictions said craig erlam senior market analyst at oanda “while the narrative in recent weeks has focused on the potential for chinese covid restrictions to be relaxed which has driven chinese equities higher and lifted oil prices the reality has seen case numbers soaring restrictions reimposed and mass testing undertaken” erlam said investors are also looking ahead to us inflation data due at 830 am new york time thursday