Oil rose for the sixth straight session to near $76 a barrel on Thursday, touching its highest in a year after US industry data showed a surprise fall in crude stockpiles, suggesting that demand in the world's top oil consumer is recovering.
Further evidence for economic recovery came from the Dow industrials piercing the 10,000 level for the first time in a year, while the dollar slumped to a fresh 14-month low against a basket of currencies as surprisingly robust corporate results cheered investors and whetted appetite for higher yielding assets.
Traders will scour weekly jobless claims and the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) inventory data later in the day for confirmation that consumption in the world's largest economy is on the mend. US crude for November delivery rose 62 cents to $75.80 a barrel by 0545 GMT, after surging as high as $75.96 earlier in electronic trading, its highest since October 2008.
London Brent crude was up 40 cents at $73.50. Crude, up 1.8 percent on the year, is now in positive territory on a year-on-year basis for the first time since October 10, 2008. The six straight days of gains mark its longest winning streak since July. Earnings are due this week from several major US companies, and the oil market is tracking results for signs of an economic rebound. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co reported a sharp rise in third-quarter results, helping to bump up US stocks on Wednesday.
US crude stocks fell 172,000 barrels last week against expectations of a 700,000 barrel rise, according to data from the American Petroleum Institute (API) on Wednesday. The EIA is due to release its report at 1500 GMT. US weekly jobless claims due at 1230 GMT will shed more light on the economy's pace of recovery. Economists polled by Reuters forecast a total of 525,000 new filings compared with 521,000 in the prior week.
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