US stock market opens higher as oil recovers

NEW YORK (AA) – The stock market opened higher Thursday as oil prices recovered from Wednesday's losses.

The Dow Jones increased 64 points to begin the day at 18,560. The S&P 500 gained six points to 2,182, while the Nasdaq was up 21 points to 5,225 at the start of the day.

After falling more than 2.5 percent Wednesday with the weekly rise in U.S.' crude inventories on Wednesday, oil prices recovered with the International Energy Agency's (IEA) report Thursday.

At the first bell, American benchmark West Texas Intermediate traded at $42.03 a barrel with a 0.8 percent gain, and international benchmark Brent crude was up to $44.46 with a 0.3 percent increase.

The IEA said in its monthly report that it expects global oil demand to increase by 1.4 million barrels per day (mbpd) to 96.3 mbpd this year, and to rise by another 1.2 mbpd to reach 97.5 mbpd next year.