Oil hovered around $106 per barrel Thursday after government reports gave a mixed read on the U.S. economic recovery.

The Commerce Department said companies trimmed orders for manufactured goods in February, suggesting that businesses are limiting their spending right now. More positive news came from the Labor Department, which said fewer people applied for unemployment benefits last week, evidence that employers could be expanding their work forces.

Benchmark crude prices fluctuated as traders digested the news. The contract for May delivery added 52 cents at $106.27 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Prices have jumped 24 percent since the middle of February, when a rebellion broke out in Libya and eventually squeezed off production that supplied nearly 2 percent of the world's oil. While rebels and pro-Gadhafi forces still battle in Libya, and the U.S. and other nations enforce a no-fly zone, some oil companies are taking their workers out of Yemen where anti-government protests have been intensifying. Yemen produces only 0.3 percent of the world's oil, according to the International Energy Administration, but it is an important transit point for crude shipments in the Middle East.