The Year Closes
Oil prices rose by nearly 8 percent on Monday, touching $44 a barrel, after Israel launched airstrikes on Hamas facilities in the Gaza strip and made preparations for a land offensive. Anger in the Arab world was widespread and religious organizations in Iran began to recruit volunteers to fight against Israel. OPEC announced that its basket of crudes fell $5.36 the previous week to $34.92 a barrel.
More
US Oil Consumption
On Monday the EIA released revised figures for US oil consumption in October showing that demand had only fallen by 833,000 b/d from a year earlier rather than the 1.4 million b/d that had been reported in preliminary estimates. According to monitoring done by the Department of Transportation, US highway travel in October was down by 3.5 percent from a year earlier. Final US gasoline consumption figures
