West Texas Intermediate crude rose after stockpiles at Cushing, Oklahoma, delivery point for the contract, dropped for the 16th time in 17 weeks. Brent gained after rebels downed a military helicopter in eastern Ukraine.

Supplies at Cushing fell 1.53 million barrels to 21.7 million last week, the lowest level since November 2008, an Energy Information Administration report showed. Nationwide stockpiles rose 1.66 million barrels to 393 million. Brent has climbed this month on concern that violence in Ukraine might lead to a disruption of shipments of oil and gas from Russia.

WTI for July delivery increased 51 cents, or 0.5 percent, to $103.23 a barrel at 11:06 a.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Futures traded at $103.06 before the release of the report at 11 a.m. in Washington. The volume of all futures traded was 41 percent below the 100-day average.

Brent for July settlement climbed 55 cents, or 0.5 percent, to $110.36 a barrel on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. Volume was 15 percent lower than the 100-day average.

Gold prices falling on the background of strong data on the U.S. labor market , which weakened demand for safe assets .

The number of Americans for the first time to apply for unemployment benefits decreased markedly last week, while reaching pre-crisis levels , suggesting continued improvement in the labor market .

The Labor Department said that for the week ending May 24 , the number of initial claims for unemployment benefits fell to a seasonally adjusted 27 000 - to 300 thousand Economists forecast that the value of this ratio will decrease to only 321 thousand

Meanwhile, add the number of applications for the previous week was revised upwards to 327 thousand from 326 thousand

Furthermore, it became known that the average number of calls in the last four weeks fell by 11,250 last week , reaching a level with 311,500 ( the lowest value since August 2007).

Many economists believe that the number of applications below 400,000 - a sign of improvement in the labor market .

In turn, in the first quarter U.S. economic activity declined markedly, while surpassing forecasts of experts , and was worse than the previous value. This was announced on revised data submitted by the Ministry of Commerce .

The report showed that the seasonally adjusted gross domestic product declined by 1.0% per annum in the first three months of this year, followed by growth of 2.6% in the fourth quarter . It is worth noting that it was the first decline in GDP in the first quarter of 2011 ( when the housekeeper was reduced by 1.3%).

Recall that in the preliminary data reported GDP growth of 0.1% , but has since been submitted new reports , which were worse than expected , and that has forced reconsideration of the GDP downward. Economists had expected the economy to shrink by 0.6%.

The cost of the June gold futures on the COMEX today dropped to $ 1250.9 per ounce.

Gold $1,259.30 -6.10 -0.48%

ICE Brent Crude Oil $110.06 +0.04 +0.04%

NYMEX Crude Oil $103.01 -1.12 -1.08%