U. S. crude oil futures ended firm on Monday as it waits for a direction from the OPEC meeting scheduled later in this week. Natural Gas continued to show weakness in demand and slid by over 2.5 percent on NYMEX.

Fujian Refining & Petrochemical Co Ltd, a joint venture between Sinopec Corp, Exxon Mobil and Saudi Aramco, plans to raise its crude processing in September by nearly
40 percent from August, industry sources said on Monday.

Vietnam's crude oil production is expected to fall 9.4 percent next year from 2009 to about 15 million tonnes, or about
300,000 bpd, the Vietnam News Agency quoted state oil monopoly Petrovietnam as saying on Monday.

Canada's Epsilon Energy Ltd said it is curtailing its natural gas production by nearly 45 percent due to lower prices. The oil and gas company said it is cutting down on natural gas production from about 3.8 million cubic feet per day (Mmcf/d) to about 2.1 Mmcf/d.

A new tropical depression has formed in the far eastern Atlantic Ocean and is expected to strengthen into a tropical storm later on Monday or Tuesday, the U. S. National Hurricane Center said.

Crude oil is expected to trade firm during the day ahead of OPEC meeting. Though it is very unlikely that OPEC tampers with the crude oil production quota, the news of imposing higher compliance on its members which has come down of late will not allow any downside in Crude oil prices. Natural gas may witness further downside during the day.