Jakarta, Financeroll.com - Oil was little changed near $49 a barrel, after falling the past two days, as U.S. crude stockpiles climbed amid signs of further economic weakness in the world’s biggest energy consumer. U.S. retail sales unexpectedly fell 1.1 percent in March, the Commerce Department said yesterday. The weekly Department of Energy report today will probably show that stockpiles increased to the highest since 1993.

The fundamentals still don’t suggest any strength. The supply levels are still at really high numbers for crude and that’s unlikely to change with the refinery capacity rates still very low.

Crude oil for May delivery was at $49.28 a barrel, down 13 cent. It earlier fell as much as 49 cents, or 1 percent, to $48.92 a barrel. Oil is up 10 percent this year after tumbling 54 percent in 2008. Yesterday, crude dropped 64 cents, or 1.3 percent, to settle at $49.41 a barrel.

Gross domestic product will contract by 3.8 percent in North America in 2009, dropping an earlier forecast for a recovery in the economy and oil demand in the second half of the year. Brent crude oil for May settlement was at $51.68 a barrel, down 28 cents, on London’s ICE Futures Europe exchange.