Pickens says oil won’t go below $100

NEW YORK (Reuters) –

Texas oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens

said on Thursday crude prices may soon fall as low as $110 a

barrel amid falling gasoline demand, but should not sink below

$100 because the United States depends heavily on oil imports.

“I don’t think it’ll drop below $100,” Pickens told Reuters

in a telephone interview. “I would say $110 is where it might

go, something like that.”

U.S. drivers have turned to public transportation and

shortened trips in response to high gasoline prices, a major

factor in oil’s drop of more than $31 a barrel since hitting a

record over $147 per barrel last month.

Pickens’ hedge fund BP Capital, which manages about $7

billion in assets, sank about 35 percent in July, according to

a report this week in the New York Post.

Pickens declined to comment in the interview about the

performance of his fund.

The U.S. Department of Transportation reported this week

that vehicle travel declined for the eighth month in a row.

(Reporting by Timothy Gardner)