Oil near record-high on supply woes, China demand

U.S. light crude for May delivery dipped 2 cents to $117.46 a barrel
by 0206 GMT, after prices hit an all-time peak of $117.83 on Monday.

"Again there are some concerns over supply disruptions in Nigeria,"
said David Moore, commodities strategist at Commonwealth Bank of
Australia.

Pipeline attacks in OPEC member Nigeria last week shut 169,000 barrels
per day (bpd) of Bonny Light production, forcing Royal Dutch Shell Plc
to declare force majeure on crude oil exports.

Nigerian rebels also attacked two Shell oil pipelines in the Niger
Delta on Monday after the raid last week in what they called an act of
defiance against major consumer the United States, the world's top
energy consumer.

Crude imports to China, the No. 2 oil user, surged a quarter from a
year ago to 4.07 million bpd in March, far above previous records,
customs data showed on Tuesday.

China also more than quadrupled March diesel imports to 494,192 tonnes
and gasoline exports tumbled 84 per cent to 101,319 tonnes in the same
period, as state oil firms rushed to stock up oil ahead of the summer
Olympics.

Sparking supply worries, the Grangemouth refinery in Scotland has
begun shutting down ahead of a two-day strike due to start on Sunday.
Some North Sea oil and natural gas output will have to be shut in if
the union halts the refinery.

But OPEC officials reiterated that the market had enough oil and the
producer group would not ramp up output to help bring down prices
despite calls for more oil from some consumer nations.

Iranian oil minister Gholamhossein Nozari said oil prices were not too
high in real terms, even as U.S. pump prices hit a new record as the
world's top consumer gears up for the summer driving season.

Though the rise in fuel costs has added pressure to the struggling
U.S. economy, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman on Monday said he did not
favour tapping emergency reserves to help bring down oil prices.

The weak U.S. dollar has also contributed to oil's rally, devaluing
assets in the U.S. currency and pushing investors to shift part of
their money to commodities and oil.

A Reuters poll of analysts ahead of weekly government inventory data
to be released on Wednesday forecast U.S. crude stocks fell 1.8
million barrels in the week to April 18, a 2.3-million-barrel drop in
gasoline supplies and a 100,000-barrel draw in distillate stocks.