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Oil prices eased in Asian trade today after Greece missed a 1.6-billion-euro payment to the International Monetary Fund.
US benchmark West Texas Intermediate for August delivery fell 68 cents to $58.79 while Brent crude was down 58 cents at $63.01.
"The Greece debt crisis may have stoked concerns of a contagion effect to the eurozone, which means that we could see a drop in demand for oil on potentially weaker growth," said Bernard Aw, a market strategist at IG Markets in Singapore.
The missed payment made cash-strapped Greece the only developed country ever to fall into default with the global crisis lender and underscored the failure of more than five months of efforts to rescue the economy and prevent it from dropping out of the eurozone.
Oil prices had rebounded yesterday as Iran and six major powers extended a deadline for reaching a nuclear deal, deferring the entry of more Iranian oil into an oversupplied global market.
