Oil jumps on US jobs rise

Oil boost: Prices gain momentum from jobs report

Scanpix/AFP

News Wires

 03 August 2012 20:31 GMT

Oil prices rose sharply on Friday, with Brent crude futures hitting a 10-week high, after a US nonfarm payrolls report showed employers added more jobs than expected in July.

US crude jumped nearly 5% as the better-than expected increase in jobs additions, even with a small rise in the unemployment rate, to 8.3%, sparked a rally in equities markets and pushed the euro up versus the dollar, Reuters reported.

The 19-commodity Thomson Reuters-Jefferies CRB index rose 2%, led by US crude as a weak dollar fed the bull market sentiment.

The dollar slipped 1% against a basket of currencies. A weaker US currency can be supportive to dollar-denominated oil and other commodities.

"Today's US employment report for July was much better than economists…

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