UPDATE 6-Oil prices slip on mixed Chinese economic data, storm impact

* China's Q2 GDP growth slowest in at least 27 years
* But industrial and retail data beat expectations
* Analysts cautious on demand growth amid trade tensions
* Standoff between Iran and the West supports prices

(New throughout, updates prices, market activity and comments;
changes byline, dateline, previous LONDON)
By Laila Kearney
NEW YORK, July 15 (Reuters) - Oil prices fell on Monday on
mixed Chinese economic data and signs that the impact of a
tropical storm on U.S. Gulf Coast production and refining would
be short-lived.
Chinese industrial output and retail data topped
expectations, but overall figures showed the country's slowest
quarterly economic growth in decades, dimming the outlook for
crude demand. Brent crude futures LCOc1 dropped 12 cents to $66.60 a
barrel by 12:04 p.m. EDT (1604 GMT), while U.S. crude CLc1
shed 40 cents to $59.81 a barrel.
Crude oil imports from China fell in June for a second
straight month, but analysts at ANZ bank said China's imports
year-to-date still looked strong. China's oil throughput rose to a record 13.07 million
barrels per day in June, up 7.7% from a year earlier, following
the start-up of two new large refineries, official data showed.
Still, economic growth of just 6.2% in the second quarter of
2019 - the weakest in 27 years - highlighted the impact of trade
tensions with Washington and raised the possibility that more
incentives might be needed to jump-start the economy.
"The basic message is that the second half of this year will
see some depletion in global oil inventories but this will be
followed by a dismal 2020, especially the first six months of
next year," PVM analyst Tamas Varga said.
Refineries in the path of Tropical Storm Barry continued to
operate after the storm prompted energy companies to slash
offshore U.S. Gulf of Mexico crude output by 73%, or 1.4 million
bpd. "The short-term impact from the storm is going to be felt,
but the longer term impact is going to be negligible," said Phil
Flynn, an analyst at Price Futures Group in Chicago.
Easing tensions between the West and the Middle East also
limited oil futures, Flynn said.
"It seems that some of the concerns that we were close to a
military conflict with Iran has eased a little bit, so that has
also weighed on prices," he said.
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said in a televised speech
on Sunday that Iran was ready to hold talks with the United
States if Washington lifted sanctions and returned to the 2015
nuclear deal it quit last year. British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said there remained a
"small window" of time to save the Iran nuclear deal as Tehran
signalled it would ramp up its nuclear programme.