By Brian Baskin 
   Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES 
 

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--Crude futures rose Wednesday, as the U.S. Federal Reserve's promise of lower interest rates convinced more investors to purchase riskier assets.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries provided some support to oil prices by agreeing early Wednesday to hold production quotas steady, but the decision was widely anticipated.

Light, sweet crude for April delivery recently traded 73 cents, or 0.9%, higher at $82.43 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude on the ICE futures exchange traded 91 cents, or 1.1%, higher at $81.44 a barrel.

Oil prices have a strong chance of making another run Wednesday at surpassing the 2010 intraday high of $83.95 a barrel, set on Jan. 11, market participants said.

Futures have backed off after approaching that price several times over the last few weeks, falling as low as $79.32 a barrel on Tuesday. Traders are encouraged by signs of economic growth in the U.S., but fear that the recovery will be slow. The Fed's statement Tuesday that it would keep interest rates "exceptionally low" for an "extended period" to keep the recovery on track helped allay fears, at least temporarily.

Equities markets overseas were lifted by the Fed's statement, and U.S. stocks are also expected to open higher, in a sign that investors will favor riskier assets--including commodities--over more-stable markets.

"They tried to sell out below $80 and couldn't do it--if we break through the $82.76 level, it just speaks to the momentum in the market," said Addison Armstrong, an analyst with Tradition Energy.

But the rally may be on hold until the release of oil inventory data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration at 10:30 a.m. EDT Wednesday. The data has often provided a reality check to the oil market this year, as supplies have only intermittently come down from the multi-decade highs seen during the recession, despite steady improvement in economic conditions.

Analysts gave an average forecast for a 1-million-barrel increase in oil inventories in a Dow Jones survey, while predicting a 600,000-barrel drop in gasoline stocks and a 1-million-barrel decline in distillate inventories, including heating oil and diesel. Refinery utilization was seen increasing 0.1 percentage point to 80.8% of capacity.

On Tuesday, the American Petroleum Institute, an industry group, reported a 400,000-barrel increase in oil inventories, a 3.7-million-barrel drop in gasoline stocks and an 800,000-barrel decline in distillate inventories.

Front-month rose reformulated gasoline blendstock, or RBOB, was recently up 2.71 cents, or 1.2%, to $2.3021 a gallon. April heating oil traded 1.58 cents, or 0.8%, higher at $2.1301 a gallon.

-By Brian Baskin, Dow Jones Newswires; 212-416-2453; brian.baskin@dowjones.com.