LONDON, Aug 8: Oil prices continued to gain ground on Friday, although traders said the move was more due to market momentum than nervousness about the perilous security situation in Iraq.

The price of benchmark Brent North Sea crude oil for September delivery was up 23 cents at $30.48 per barrel.

New York’s reference light sweet crude September contract showed a gain of 28 cents to $32.67 per barrel in early trading.

The increases followed steep gains on Thursday in New York, where traders had fretted about low levels of commercial crude and gasoline inventories in the energy-hungry United States as well as supply concerns.

Analysts said prices were mainly influenced by a continued bounce-back from slumps on Wednesday after figures from the US Department of Energy (DoE) and the American Petroleum Institute (API) showed an increase in US crude stocks.

“It’s following through from a good recovery that the market made Thursday,” said Prudential Bache analyst Tony Machacek.

“I don’t thing there is a lot of significant news in the market that we are reacting to.

“But after Wednesday’s rather aggressive sell-off post the API and DoE statistics, the market was able to recover quite substantially on Thursday,” he said.

In contrast, events in Iraq were having little impact for now, he said.

“It may be having a mild effect on the market but I don’t think that’s really what we are reacting to at the moment.”—AFP