by Veronique Dupont
NEW YORK, Aug 24 (AFP) - Oil prices skidded Tuesday for the third straight trading day as Iraq pumped more oil through its southern pipelines and Russia vowed to ramp up exports.
New York's main contract, light sweet crude for October delivery, dropped 84 cents to 45.21 dollars a barrel, a dramatic retreat from Friday's all-time high 49.40 dollars.
Brent North Sea crude oil for delivery in October fell 71 cents to 42.32 dollars.
"Oil is flowing out of Iraq, and there is some evidence of economic slowdown. We are not near recession anywhere (in the world) but it's still having an impact," said AG Edwards market analyst Bill O'Grady.
Speculators, who had inflated prices, appeared to be leaving the market after the New York contract failed to hit the 50-dollar mark on Friday, O'Grady said.
"When the momentum runs out there is no reason for speculators to stick around, which makes me think there could be more losses in the coming days unless the fundamentals change," he said.
The price slide could still be halted by, for example, a fresh interruption in oil supplies from Iraq or indications of tight US commercial oil inventories in weekly data due Wednesday, O'Grady said.
Officials at the South Oil Company in Iraq said Monday oil exports from the south were moving at 83,000 barrels an hour, about the normal rate, after being halved because of threats by Shiite Muslim militia.
Russian President Vladimir Putin gave further comfort to the market, telling US President George W. Bush in a telephone call that oil companies would boost exports, a White House spokesman said.
The comment only partially offset concerns over the fate of stricken Russian oil titan Yukos, which has cut its 2004 output forecast because of constraints on financing.
The threat of a strike in oil-rich Venezuela also appeared to have faded after President Hugo Chavez's recent victory in a referendum on his rule.
"Venezuela has moved away as an issue," Commerzbank analyst Jon Rigby said in London.
"We are in a relatively quiet period. That's the reason why the speculative wave that we saw last week has dried to death and prices are drifting off," he said.
But fighting in Iraq kept the oil market on edge.
Hundreds of heavily armed Iraqi and US troops were braced for an assault on Najaf's holy shrine, on orders to kill or capture militia leader Moqtada Sadr unless he surrendered within hours.
"Iraq remains a major worry for the market amid ongoing fighting around a shrine in the holy city of Najaf, which some analysts fear could destabilise a greater portion of the oil-producing south if it continues unchecked," analysts for the Sucden brokerage firm said.