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By Bloomberg

Oil held losses to trade near $59 a barrel as investors weighed forecasts for easing U.S. crude stockpiles against signs that a global glut will persist.

Futures were little changed in New York after falling 0.2 percent Monday. Crude inventories probably dropped by 500,000 barrels through May 8, a Bloomberg survey of analysts showed before government data Wednesday. There’s an oversupply of at least 2 million barrels a day and OPEC shouldn’t change its production target, according to Qatar’s former energy minister.

Oil’s rebound from a six-year low in March is faltering as U.S. crude stockpiles are still more than 100 million barrels above the five-year average for this time of year. The nation’s output also remains near a record even as drillers reduced the number of active rigs to the fewest since September 2010.

“We’re seeing lower crude numbers but it’s not enough,” David Lennox, a resource analyst at Fat Prophets in Sydney, said by phone. “We’ve seen the bottom but we still need real positive cuts in current production.”

West Texas Intermediate for June delivery was at $59.18 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, down 7 cents, at 12:10 p.m. Singapore time. The contract lost 14 cents to $59.25 on Monday. The volume of all futures traded was about 73 percent below the 100-day average. Prices have increased 11 percent this year.

U.S. Supplies

Brent for June settlement was 13 cents lower at $64.78 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. It slid 48 cents to $64.91 on Monday. The European benchmark crude traded at a premium of $5.59 to WTI.

U.S. output from shale formations such as North Dakota’s Bakken and the Eagle Ford in Texas is set to decrease further in June to a five-month low of 5.56 million a day, the Energy Information Administration said in a monthly report Monday. Production will shrink by 54,227 barrels a day in May, according to the Energy Department’s statistical arm.

Crude inventories in the U.S., the world’s biggest oil user, fell to 487 million barrels in the week ended May 1, EIA data showed on May 6. That’s the first drop since January. Supplies remain near the highest level since 1930, based on monthly records dating back to 1920.

Drillers seeking oil cut the number of active machines to 668 through May 8, according to Baker Hughes Inc., an oilfield- services company. The rig count has declined 58 percent since December.

OPEC Quota

Oil will fluctuate in a range of $60 to $70 a barrel in “coming years,” Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah, Qatar’s energy minister from 1992 to 2011, told reporters in Kuwait on Monday, without specifying a time period. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries won’t change its output at a June 5 meeting without cooperation from other producers, according to the group’s former president.

OPEC, which supplies about 40 percent of the world’s oil, resisted calls to reduce production at a November gathering and kept its quota at 30 million barrels a day. The 12-member group has pumped above that level the past 11 months, a Bloomberg survey of companies and analysts showed.

Oil’s recovery is masking a persisting surplus that will thwart further gains, according to Barclays Plc, Societe Generale SA and Morgan Stanley. Slowing U.S. output is drawing attention from rising global supplies and prices will probably slip before the end of this quarter, Societe Generale predicted.