Oil $101/barrel Gold Nearly $1500/oz

New York oil prices briefly hit $101 on Wednesday, as Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi’s regime loyalists clashed with opposition rebels, while safe-haven gold struck another record high point.

Oil Rises, Dollar Falls, Gold $1000/oz

Oil futures rose above $69 a barrel on Tuesday, as sharp weakness in the U.S. dollar boosted commodities and energy traders eyed the upcoming meeting of the OPEC oil cartel.

Light sweet crude for October delivery gained $1.55, or 2.3%, to $69.59 a barrel in electronic trading on Globex. Nimit Khamar, analyst at Sucden Financial Research in London, said that the oil market is focused on the meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries that will begin on Wednesday in Vienna.

“It appears likely that they will be discussing compliance with existing production quotas,” Khamar said, adding that OPEC compliances rates are falling.

“It seems that they all very much share the view that quotas are likely to remain on hold,” he said. Khamar also said that there could be discussion of possible future output cuts since “inventory levels are still very high and the economic recovery is still very fragile.”

The sharp weakness in the U.S. dollar and rising global equities also boosted dollar-denominated commodities on Tuesday, according to Khamar.

The greenback fell sharply against its major rivals on Tuesday. The euro surged 0.9% to $1.4466 and the British pound soared 1.3% to $1.6551. The dollar fell 1% against the Japanese yen. Elsewhere in the commodity markets, gold futures soared above $1,000 an ounce, buoyed by dollar weakness

Source: www.marketwatch.com

Oil $US 72/Barrel

Oil prices rose for the third consecutive day today as the International Energy Agency (IEA) published its most upbeat data for 10 months and suggested the global recession might be past its peak.

In its closely watched monthly survey, the Paris-based agency said that global oil demand would fall by 2.9 per cent to 83.3 million barrels a day this year, a less severe fall than it predicted last month.

In May, the IEA was expecting a 3 per cent annual fall in demand, the sharpest rate of decline since 1981.

Has The Oil Bubble Burst? Oil $127/Barrel

Light, sweet crude for August delivery fell US$3.80 at US$127.24 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Earlier, the contract dropped as low as US$126.26. In London, September Brent fell US$3.74 to US$128.89 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange.

The declines offered further evidence that investors who only a week and a half ago drove prices to a new record above US$147 a barrel are now pulling money out of the market. There are also indications that the price of oil is killing demand, especially in the U.S., which consumes far more oil than any other country.

“This is more of the long exit from the market by the hedge funds,” said Jim Ritterbusch, president of energy consultancy Ritterbusch and Associates. “A lot of these investors who have been supporting prices are hitting the road”

Ah the citizens of the world have had their roller coaster ride slow down.

• Oil Falls US$4 To US127 A Barrel
• Oil Slides Below $127 as Supply Worries Ease

Oil Speculators To Be Probe By British MPs [Oil $146/Barrel]

  

Source – Wikipedia

Concern over the possible role of speculators in driving record crude oil prices has prompted the House of Commons’ Treasury select committee to hold its first hearing into regulation of London’s oil markets, John McFall, the committee’s chairman, said on Thursday.

The development is a sign that the intense political pressure to address – or, at least, be seen to address – the causes of high oil prices are emerging in Britain after initially appearing in the US. In recent weeks, Congress has held multiple hearings on the issue. 

The US House of Representatives last week passed by a big margin legislation requiring the US futures and commodities watchdog, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to “utilise all its authority, including emergency powers, to take steps to curb excessive speculation in the energy futures markets”.

Mr McFall, a Labour MP for West Dumbartonshire, said that the two US presidential candidates, Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, as well as independent senator Joseph Lieberman, all had expressed concern about the role of speculation in oil markets.

He said he planned to hold a hearing into the issue – set for July 15.

Mr McFall told a meeting of the UK’s parliamentary liaison committee: “There is a real problem here. We really need to some action because it’s reported there is $260bn of speculative money in the oil futures market.”

FULL STORY

• Investors Bet On Oil $300 This Year