by Perrine Faye
LONDON, July 29 (AFP) - Oil prices eased back on profit taking from record high levels on Thursday after Russia's justice ministry said embattled oil giant Yukos can continue oil production and sales.
But traders remained nervous about the risk of disruption to supplies from Russia, whose oil is seen as crucial for the world's future energy needs.
The price of benchmark Brent North Sea crude oil for delivery in September dropped 48 cents per barrel to 39.05 dollars in late trading in London.
New York's reference contract, light sweet crude for September delivery, fell 40 cents to 42.50 dollars in early dealing.
"Prices are having a little setback on the Yukos story and on profit taking from the highs seen yesterday," Prudential Bache trader Christopher Bellew said.
The US contract shot to an all-time high of 43.05 dollars a barrel on Wednesday after Yukos, Russia's largest oil producer, warned it could halt output within days because court bailiffs had ordered its subsidiaries to halt all operations that would affect the state of their assets.
But markets cooled somewhat Thursday after official orders signed by a Russian justice ministry bailiff said that three of the group's key subsidiaries can continue sales and production.
According to ministry statements obtained by AFP, the orders concern Yuganskneftegaz, Samarneftegaz and Tomskneftegaz, which together account for 1.6 million of the 1.7 million barrels of oil that Yukos produces each day.
But they confirmed that their property and other assets remained frozen as Yukos faces a massive tax bill that the company has been unable to pay.
Bellew predicted that prices would rise again soon.
"I think (the fall) is probably a temporary setback," he said.
"I think we will see technical and fund buying pushing the market up again before too long. The funds have further room to increase their length."
Despite the price falls, traders remained nervous about already tight supplies and the precarious situation of Yukos.
"There is a definite shortage in the market of crude oil," said Keith Pascall, a trader at GNI-Man Financial.
"The market is very worried about Yukos. There is not enough oil around already, so what will happen with another exporter going down or not being able to export anymore?"
Producers are already straining to meet rising demand for oil and the OPEC oil cartel's spare output capacity is rapidly dwindling, experts noted.
"Yukos's oil production including joint ventures runs at about 1.8 million barrels per day, about half of which is exported," said Merrill Lynch analyst Michael Rothman.
"Such a supply loss -- if it were to occur -- falls under the heading of 'unexpectedly bullish', particularly given the fact that OPEC's volume of spare output capacity has been chewed down to the point where we only have about a million barrels/day of incremental availability excluding Iraq," he wrote in a note to clients.
"Part of the reason were seeing so much pressure on oil prices currently stems from incredibly (and inexplicably) high oil demand," he added.
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries was keeping a close watch on the problems at Yukos, OPEC president Purnomo Yusgiantoro said.
"The Yukos question has already had a psychological impact on the market and OPEC is extremely concerned with this issue because it influences supply and demand," Yusgiantoro, also Indonesia's energy minister, told reporters in Jakarta.
OPEC agreed in early June to raise its output ceiling by two million barrels per day this month and by an additional 500,000 barrels on August 1.