World
Institutional
links
Welcome back on
26 -29 August,
ONS 2008
Bridging
the energy gap
is ONS 2006 theme,
from 22-25 August,
in Stavanger, Norway
Petroleumworld
Business
Partners:
Centre for
Global Energy
Studies
  |
Oil retreats below 93 dollars
SINGAPORE
Petroleumworld.com 10 30 07Oil retreated in Asian trade Tuesday after spiking to a historic high of over 93 dollars on geopolitical concerns in the Middle East, dealers said.
At 3:40 pm (0740 GMT) New York's main contract, light sweet crude for December delivery, was 60 cents lower at 92.93 dollars a barrel from its record closing of 93.53 dollars in late US trades Monday.
The contract set a new intraday high of 93.80 dollars on Monday.
Brent North Sea crude for December delivery dropped 61 cents to 89.71 dollars. It hit a record intraday high of 93.80 dollars Monday.
"It has pulled back a bit from the record high yesterday so there is some profit-taking in the market," said Victor Shum, a Singapore-based analyst with energy consultancy Purvin and Gertz.
Investors pushed up prices Monday on continued concerns over tensions in the Middle East which they fear may disrupt supplies and eventually strain already tight global stocks, dealers said.
"Crude oil prices continue to set records due to a potent cocktail of bullish factors... tightening physical fundamentals, a weakening dollar and perceived geopolitical risk," analysts from Societe Generale said in a report.
Shum said the market still has enough firepower to scale fresh record peaks as the factors that pushed prices this far remained on the radar screen of investors.
"I think the market is still very bullish... we still have a number of simmering factors that are all quite potentially bullish," said Shum.
"We continue to have the Turkey-Kurdish situation, the geopolitical factors on top of supply concerns out of an overall tight market."
The US dollar's weakness was also a factor for the record run Monday as investors find commodity futures including oil a cheaper alternative to place their funds which is priced in the greenback, dealers said.
"The weak dollar is a critical issue for the oil markets... investors see commodities and oil as the best hedge against inflation and the weaker dollar," Societe Generale analysts said.
Story from AFP 30 0830 GMT 10 07
Copyright© 2007 Petroleumworld. All rights reserved.
Your
feedback is important to us!
We invite all our readers to share with us
their views and comments about this article.
Write to editor@petroleumworld.com
Any
question or suggestions, please write to:
editor@petroleumworld.com
Best
Viewed with IE
5.01+
Windows
NT 4.0, '95, '98 and ME +/ 800x600 pixels