By V. Phani Kumar, MarketWatch
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) — Crude-oil futures extended their advance Monday, with a rise for U.S. equity futures and a drop for the dollar underpinning buying interest after Cyprus secured a last-minute bailout.
The May futures contract for light, sweet crude-oil futures CLK3 +0.40% climbed 46 cents, or 0.5%, to $94.17 a barrel. The rise comes on top of a $1.26 advance on the New York Mercantile Exchange that helped pare the commodity’s weekly loss on Friday.
The front-month contract rose as high as $94.25 earlier in the day.
The May Brent futures contract UK:LCOK3 +0.49% , Europe’s benchmark for crude-oil, climbed 54 cents, or 0.5%, to $108.20 a barrel.
The advance followed an agreement earlier in the day that paved the way for Cyprus to receive up to 10 billion euros ($13 billion) in bailout funds from the troika — the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund — to avert a potential collapse of the European nation’s financial system.
The ICE dollar index DXY -0.07% , which measures the greenback’s moves against a basket of six major global currencies, fell to 82.242 from 82.387 in North America on Friday. A weakened dollar helps lift prices of commodities, including crude-oil, by making it cheaper to holders of other currencies. Read currencies market report.
U.S. equity futures were also higher, pointing to a likely higher start for stocks on Wall Street, as investor appetite for assets deemed to be riskier improved. Dow Jones Industrial Average futures DJM3 +0.26% were up 33 points, or 0.2%, at 14,492. See: Stock futures lifted by Cyprus deal.
Among other products in the energy complex, the April contract for gasoline RBJ3 +0.19% was unchanged at $3.06 a gallon and heating-oil futures HOJ3 +0.42% for delivery in the same month edged up 0.2% to $2.89 a gallon.
April futures for natural gas NGJ13 +0.61% climbed 0.7% to $3.95 per million British thermal units.
