FRANKFURT (MarketWatch) -- Oil futures rose to trade near $73 a barrel on Monday, as indications of a higher open on Wall Street buoyed sentiment in the energy market. Crude oil for November delivery gained $1.15, or 1.6%, to $72.92 a barrel in electronic trading on Globex. Earlier in the session, the contract hit an intraday high of $73.13 a barrel. Oil prices are "underpinned by equity gains as well as an upbeat demand outlook from the International Energy Agency," said analysts at Action Economics. U.S. stock futures were trading higher on Monday, as a busy week of earnings gets underway, kicked off by a surprise profit from Dutch-based conglomerate Philips Electronics (PHG 25.11, +0.01, +0.04%) . See Indications. There is no U.S. economic data scheduled for Monday, but later in the week investors will get updates on retail sales, industrial production and consumer confidence. The Paris-based IEA raised its forecasts on Friday for global oil demand for both this year and 2010, citing more optimistic economic estimates issued by the International Monetary Fund as well as strong preliminary data from the Americas and Asia. The agency raised its expectations by 200,000 barrels a day, to average demand of 84.6 million barrels a day, for 2009, and by 350,000 barrels a day, to 86.1 million barrels a day, for 2010. "The markets viewed this as an indication that fundamentals [will] start to improve," said analysts at Commerzbank in a note to clients. "It has to be taken into account, however, that, among all agencies, the IEA, by previously expecting a demand [to] decline by 1.9 million barrel per day, had the most pessimistic view on the 2009 oil demand," they said. Also on Globex, November reformulated gasoline gained 2 cents to $1.79 a gallon and November heating oil rose 2 cents to $1.88 a gallon. November natural-gas futures rose 11 cents, or 2.3%, to $4.88 per million British thermal units.

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