Oil steadied on Thursday as growing expectations that global supply could fall significantly short of demand this year lent support, offsetting the negative impact of a rise in U.S. inventories. Brent crude oil futures were last down 12 cents at $62.57 a barrel by 1022 GMT, while U.S. crude futures were down 7 cents at $53.94 a barrel. The oil price came under pressure earlier in the day following weekly data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration on Wednesday that showed an unwelcome increase in stocks of crude oil. Still, some analysts were relieved that U.S. crude oil inventories only rose by 1.3 million barrels in the week to Feb. 1, according to the EIA, compared with expectations for an increase of 2.2 […]