* Brent and U.S. crude down more than 2 pct
* Wall Street's S&P index hits 1-month low
* China industrial profits shrink in August
* Genscape estimates 1 mln bbl drawdown at Cushing
(Adds latest market moves)
By Barani Krishnan
NEW YORK, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Oil prices fell more than 2
percent on Monday, pressured by tumbling equities on Wall Street
and weak Chinese economic data, although an estimated drawdown
in crude stocks at the key U.S. storage hub appeared to limit
losses, traders said.
Gyrations in U.S. equity prices .DJI and the dollar
.DXY from bets on the timing of the first U.S. rate hike in
nearly a decade have fed volatility in oil prices, which have
swung up to 8 percent a day over the past month.
New York Federal Reserve President William Dudley added to
the expectations of an early rate increase, suggesting the
central bank could pull the trigger as soon as in
October. ID:nN9N11800C
Wall Street's S&P 500 index .SPX was down 2.2 percent
after hitting an Aug. 26 low on bullish U.S. consumer spending
data in August and bets of a rate hike by October. .N
"There are more sellers than buyers in oil today and we
could break the $44 support for WTI on the downside," said Tariq
Zahir, who trades long-dated crude oil spreads at Tyche Capital
Advisors in Laurel Hollow, New York.
Brent LCOc1 , the key indicator for global crude prices,
fell $1.14 to $47.465 a barrel by 1:48 p.m. EDT (1748 GMT).
The U.S. crude benchmark CLc1 , West Texas Intermediate
(WTI) was down $1.26 at $44.44, after a session low at $44.31.
Heavy oil oversupply and eroding demand for energy in No. 2
economy China and other Asian and emerging markets have halved
crude prices over the last year.
In China, also the world's largest commodities consumer,
industrial companies' profits fell at their fastest rate in four
years, sparking fresh worries about manufacturing activity
reports due later this week. ID:nL3N11Y17Y
Offsetting some of that bearish sentiment was data from
market intelligence firm Genscape estimating a drawdown of over
1 million barrels last week from the Cushing, Oklahoma delivery
hub for U.S. crude, traders who saw the figures said.
Genscape's Cushing stockpile estimates are a precursor to
official inventory data on U.S. crude due each Wednesday from
the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Genscape had
estimated draws of around 2 million barrels in each of the past
two weeks.
"We've been discussing the possibility that oil needs to
move down to $30, but I think that is only if you run out of
storage capacity and given that (there is) still quite
substantial storage capacity, in my view you still have
flexibility," said Bjarne Schieldrop, chief commodity analyst at
SEB.