Crude oil advanced in New York, heading for a fourth week of gains, as investors bet fuel demand will increase amid signs Europe and the U.S. will contain their debt crises. Futures climbed for a fourth day after euro-area leaders yesterday announced 159 billion euros ($229 billion) in new aid for Greece late yesterday and cajoled bondholders into footing part of the bill. Prices also rose amid speculation U.S. President Barack Obama may agree a deal to raise the country’s $14.3 trillion debt ceiling before an Aug. 2 deadline. “There’s more relief over debt measures so there’s this feel-good sense to the equity markets and that’s dragging up the price of oil,” said Jonathan Barratt, a managing director of Commodity Broking Services Pty in Sydney, who predicts oil in New York will average $100 a barrel this year. A resolution in the U.S. “will add to this optimism, which should push crude oil through $100 a barrel, even up to $102,” he said. Crude for September delivery advanced as much as 48 cents to $99.61 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange and was at $99.41 at 1:28 p.m. Sydney time. The contract yesterday gained 73 cents to $99.13, the highest since June 14. Prices are up 2.3 percent this week and have climbed 25 percent the past year. Brent oil for September settlement increased 34 cents, or 0.3 percent, to $117.85 on the London-based ICE Futures Europe exchange. The European benchmark contract traded at a premium of $18.40 a barrel to U.S. futures, compared with a record close of $22.63 on July 14. Greek Aid Oil rose as Asian stocks advanced, with the regional benchmark index erasing its loss for the year. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index gained 0.7 percent as of 10:55 a.m. in Tokyo, heading for its highest close since July 8. European leaders empowered their 440 billion-euro rescue fund to buy debt across stressed nations, helping to erect a firewall around Spain and Italy even as they risked temporary default to lighten the Greek debt burden. In the U.S., Democrats reacted angrily to reports that the White House is cutting a deal with House Republicans to boost the debt ceiling and reduce deficits by about $3 trillion over 10 years without immediate revenue increases. Obama’s team has told congressional leaders it is pursuing such a deal, according to two officials familiar with the talks, as the White House and House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio denied one was at hand. IEA Supplies Crude in New York rose yesterday after the International Energy Agency said it won’t extend a release of oil supplies. The IEA said that while it’s prepared to “augment” the sale of 60 million barrels of emergency oil stockpiles first announced on June 23, this intervention and higher output from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries will for now “substantially cover” the loss of exports caused by an armed conflict in Libya. The Libyan revolt, which began in February, has reduced the availability of light, sweet crude, or oil with low density and sulfur content. The country’s output fell 50,000 barrels, or 25 percent, to 150,000 barrels a day last month, a Bloomberg News survey showed, the lowest amount in yearly data since 1962. It pumped 1.59 million barrels in January, before the uprising. The IEA’s action was the third time the agency has coordinated the use of emergency stockpiles since it was founded in 1974. The first was during the 1991 Persian Gulf War and the second in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf of Mexico. To contact the reporters on this story: Ben Sharples in Melbourne at bsharples@bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Alexander Kwiatkowski in Singapore at akwiatkowsk2@bloomberg.net

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