After People’s Bank of China raised the reserve requirement ratio by 50 basis points, crude oil futures increased Monday in Asia. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, crude oil futures for January settlement traded at $88.20 a barrel, which climbed $0.41 in the Globes electronic session. Brent crude, on the other hand, increased $0.57 to $91.05 a barrel on London’s ICE Futures Exchange. Meanwhile, Nymex reformulated gasoline blendstock for January delivery, which is considered the benchmark gasoline contract, increased 147 points to $2.3240 a gallon while heating oil for January settlement gained 121 points to $2.4696. ICE gasoil for January delivery traded at $767.00 a metric ton, up $6.00 from Friday’s settlement. However, analysts believed that a further increase is unlikely, citing caution among traders. Hiroyuki Kikukawa, an analyst at Nihon Unicom, said that traders are cautious about taking large positions as trading volume is decreasing ahead of the year-end holiday season. Analysts said that the increase is likely to be capped around $90 a barrel with a sluggish market. In case of further gains above $90, it will be after the New Year. China’s National Bureau of Statistics said that the country’s refinery runs totaled 36.65 million metric tons in November, equivalent to a record 8.95 million barrels a day and was up 10.3 percent from a year earlier. This report has forced China’s crude runs in the January to November period to 384.6 million tons, which is up 13.6 percent with the same period in 2009. Analysts said that neither the data from China nor stock markets’ performance has directly influenced the increase in crude prices, although it has help brighten sentiment on top of hopes of US economic recovery. In addition, the China data will give traders the sense that growth will continue in the world’s largest energy consumer and the dollar will continue to flood the global market.

Source