On the New York Mercantile Exchange light, sweet crude futures for delivery in May traded at $100.72 a barrel at 0620 GMT–up $0.13 in the Globex electronic session. June Brent crude on London’s ICE Futures exchange rose $0.01 to $108.42 a barrel. Industrial production in China slowed to 8.7% year over year in April compared with 8.8% in March and retail-sales growth eased to 11.9% from 12.2% in March. The data strengthened calls for monetary and policy easing, analysts said. Earlier in the day the market “largely ignored” news of a possible doubling of Libya’s oil production following the reopening of oil fields and pipelines on Monday after an eight-month blockade by protesters, Citigroup said in a report. “Given the history of inconsistent output of the past year we’d say the market is right to remain skeptical of any promised recovery but we also continue to view any sustained […]