oil futures rose wednesday with investors and analysts fixated on prospects for a pickup in crude demand from china after the country shed covid curbs that were seen curtailing consumption by one of the world’s largest energy importers   west texas intermediate crude for march delivery cl1 cl00 clh23 rose 66 cents or 08 to 8081 a barrel on the new york mercantile exchange   march brent crude brnh23 the global benchmark was up 64 cents or 07 at 8676 a barrel on ice futures europe april brent brn00 brnj23 the most actively traded contract gained 57 cents or 07 to trade at 8676 a barrel   back on nymex february gasoline rbg23 edged up 01 to 2597 a gallon while february heating oil hog23 ticked down 01 to 3359 a gallon   february natural gas ngg23 dropped 7 to 2852 per million british thermal units while march natural gas ngh23 the most actively traded contract declined 52 to 2763 per million btus based on the most actively traded contract natural gas was on track for a nearly 9 weekly fall and has dropped by nearly 33 so far in january oil stumbled to begin the year but has bounced back with wti back in positive territory for the month on optimism over the outlook for crude demand from china the bounce has “coincided with a significant fundamental shift in the global macroeconomic landscape that should sow the seeds for further oil price appreciation from here as bullish reopening expectations continue to build on the premise that fullon china demand is nowhere near reflected in current market prices especially if international travel continues to open up” said stephen innes managing partner at spi asset management in a note natural gas meanwhile has tumbled amid unseasonably warm weather in the us and much of the northern hemisphere that’s helped europe to refill naturalgas supplies averting a winter heating crunch that had been widely feared as a result of russia’s invasion of ukraine the us energy information administration was expected to report an 84billion cubic feet bcf withdrawal from us natural gas storage for the week ended jan 20 according to a survey of analysts by sp global commodity insights if accurate us inventories would drop to 2736 trillion cubic feet widening the storage surplus to 135 bcf or more than 5 above the fiveyear average according to sp the undersized drawdown would also leave domestic inventories up 114 bcf or 4 compared with the yearago level