SHANGHAI, July 11 (Xinhua) -- Crude oil futures closed lower Thursday on the Shanghai International Energy Exchange.

The most active crude oil contract for August delivery gained 20 yuan (about 2.91 U.S. dollars) to close at 461.6 yuan a barrel.

On Thursday the total trading volume for nine listed crude oil futures contracts on the exchange was 354,600 lots, with a turnover of about 161.1 billion yuan.

China launched the crude oil futures trading, which is open to overseas investment, on March 26 last year.