Crude falls further on stronger dollar

23 April 2010

Written by Bob Burton

Crude oil prices slipped further on the New York Mercantile Exchange this morning (April 23rd), weighed down by a stronger dollar.

By the time European markets opened, the headline crude futures contract was trading at $83.48 a barrel, down 22 cents on yesterday's settle price.

Both crude and heating oil suffered in trading yesterday after a demand report from the Energy Information Administration showed an unexpected rise in crude inventories.

This morning, it was a stronger dollar holding the commodities back, with the global reserve currency hitting its highest level in almost a year against the euro.

Peter McGuire, managing director at CWA Global Markets Pty in Sydney, told Bloomberg: "Oil is taking a bit of a breather, the US dollar strengthened and that has knocked it over a bit. Over the next two to three months there is more upside."

Oil looks set to record a 0.4 per cent price rise this week, against a two percent drop last week.

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