NEW YORK—The bruising selloff in crude-oil futures continued into a fourth day, as election results in France and Greece sparked fresh worries over whether hard-fought economic austerity measures would hold.
Light, sweet-crude oil for June delivery was off 82 cents at $97.67 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract lost $7.67 a barrel, or 7.2%, in the prior three session, settling Friday at the lowest level since Dec. 14.
ICE Brent for June delivery was 44 cents lower, at $112.73 a barrel, after shedding 5.4% over the previous three sessions and ending Friday at the lowest level since Feb. 2.
New doubts about European sovereign debt came to the forefront as the U.S. economic recovery is showing signs of sputtering and oil inventories have built to 22-year highs.
Voters in France over the weekend ousted the party of Nicolas Sarkozy, a leading player in the sovereign-debt deals, while Greece faces new challenges in patching together a coalition government.
"The big news is clearly Greece and France, basically there is a lot of worry about new governments and what this means for the austerity measures that have been worked on very diligently," said Tom Bentz, director at BNP Paribas Prime Brokerage in New York.
"The bears are in control and I don't think we're done yet," he said. U.S. benchmark crude would need to settle back above $100 to show strong signs of a rebound, while a test down to the low $90s, last seen on a sustained basis in November 2011 is possible, he said.
Commitments of traders reports issued by Nymex and ICE showed large speculators boosted their net long positions in the benchmark contracts ahead of the big selling off last week. Traders said these investors, poised for prices to move higher, likely sold those contracts aggressively, escalating the scope of the late-week slide.
U.S. data on Friday showed a much smaller-than-expected increase in nonfarm payrolls in April, igniting worries about the economic health of the world's biggest oil consumer and the impact on oil demand.
Crude-oil prices would need to move below $90 and stay there for an extended period to give a considerable upside jolt to the economy, analysts said.
Reformulated-gasoline-blendstock futures for June delivery were off 1.42 cents, at $2.9616 a gallon, after dropping 5.4% in the previous five sessions and settling Friday at the lowest level since Feb. 10.
June heating-oil futures were down 2.54 cents, at $2.9834 a gallon. The contract lost 5.5% in the previous four days, settling Friday at the lowest level since Jan. 20.
