Concerns about demand cause oil prices to fall.

Oil prices dipped in the early hours of Thursday as traders projected increased crude supply and weaker demand.By 0005 GMT, Brent crude prices had down 53 cents, or 0.5%, to $96.87 per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate crude futures had fallen 61 cents, or 0.7%, to $91.32.

The US Energy Information Administration said that crude oil stocks increased by 5.5 million barrels in the most recent week, above the predicted increase of 73,000 barrels.Gasoline product supply increased in the most recent week to 9.1 million barrels per day, yet demand is still down 6% over the last four weeks compared to the same period last year.

Flows on the Druzhba pipeline from Russia to Europe restarted earlier this week.Transneft, Russia’s state oil pipeline monopoly, has restarted oil flows through the southern portion of the Druzhba oil pipeline. Transneft said on Tuesday that Ukraine had blocked Russian oil pipeline shipments to portions of central Europe since early this month because Western sanctions prohibited it from obtaining transit fees from Moscow.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) and the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) will release their monthly oil statistics later today.