Oil futures and retail gasoline prices slip lower

Oil slipped lower in New York futures trading but managed to stay above $90 a barrel.

The U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate grade of crude declined 10 cents to $90.76 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange because of trader concerns about European economies. In London, the European benchmark Brent crude fell 75 cents to $106.36.

Meanwhile, motorists were enjoying a bit of relief at the pump – even in California where the average gasoline price set a record over the Memorial Day weekend.

The U.S. average price for a gallon of self-serve regular gasoline dropped half a penny to $3.636 on Tuesday, according to AAA’s daily survey of fuel retailers. A week earlier, the average was $3.680.

In California, the average declined by two-tenths of a cent to $4.281. That’s down 4.9 cents from a week earlier.

Until about two weeks ago, refinery outages in California were helping pump prices in the state to rise even though most of the rest of the nation was seeing prices move lower.

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