Oil jumps to six month high


Record Oil PricesOil continued its charge today and traded up 3.4% to close the week out at $58.63 and creates a situation where we could very likely be looking at $60 oil again by the end of next week. The last time oil was trading this high was all the way back on November 11.

On Monday we looked at oil, and noted that a big reason for oil's recent jump is increasing optimism towards the overall economy, and that is still the case. The Labor Department reported a drop of 539,000 non-farm payrolls in April, lower than the anticipated loss of 610,000 jobs.

Also, Iran has helped to give prices a boost after announcing that OPEC will consider cutting output at its upcoming meeting later this month. Any indication that OPEC could tighten up production will lift oil prices, but it is highly doubtful that any such cut would be coming this time around. The recent run up in prices will probably prevent OPEC from justifying any cuts, especially this close to the summer driving months.

With today's action, oil prices have risen seven out of the past eight trading days, and picked up an amazing 17.5% just since the 28th of April. At some point you would have to assume there will be some profit taking, but at this rate we will be in the $60's before you know it.

How high do you think oil will head this summer? After last summer's record setting prices it will be very interesting to see just how high oil will head again this year as we move into the summer driving months.

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