By Polya Lesova, MarketWatch FRANKFURT (MarketWatch) -- Crude-oil futures held in a narrow range above $81 a barrel Friday, as the energy market looked for direction ahead of U.S. housing data and the latest string of corporate earnings reports. Crude for December delivery gained 5 cents to $81.24 a barrel in electronic trading on Globex. The contract earlier rose to an intraday high of $81.78 a barrel. Prices had finished marginally lower on Thursday. "The main upside driver remains the dollar," said Edward Meir, senior commodity analyst at MF Global. "We are wary about joining the 'weak dollar' bandwagon at this stage in the game, especially given relatively oversold conditions and the fact that the rest of energy's fundamentals do not look that constructive," Meir wrote in a note to clients. In foreign-exchange trading, the U.S. dollar rose sharply against the British pound and moved slightly higher against most other major rivals. The dollar index (DXY 75.28, +0.19, +0.25%) , which tracks the performance of the greenback against a basket of other major currencies, edged up 0.1% to 75.201. See Currencies. Energy investors will watch for data on existing-home sales for September, due at 10 a.m. Eastern, in seeking further indications about the state of the largest global economy. Also on traders' radar screens, Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke is scheduled to speak on regulation at 8:30 a.m. Eastern, and Vice Chairman Donald Kohn will speak later in the day. Elsewhere in the commodity markets, December gold futures rose $3.30 to stand at $1,061.90 an ounce in electronic Globex trading.

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