After a prolonged slide that took oil prices within sight of the $20-a-barrel threshold last month, sentiment in commodity markets seems to have turned, raising the question of whether oil prices have finally bottomed out.
Whether it will prove lasting or not remains to be seen, but the recent rebound in the oil market comes as investors focus on declines in oil drilling and pin their hopes on a freeze in output by major producers.
Crude oil futures traded in New York rose 5.5 percent on Monday to $37.90 a barrel, after rising nearly 4 percent on Friday. The U.S. benchmark price has had three straight weeks of gains, the longest such stretch since May. In London, Brent oil futures rose above $40 a barrel for the first time since December.
Oil markets have bounced back more than 40 percent since hitting of a low of $26.21 a barrel in New York in early February. At the time, many analysts, including forecasters at Goldman Sachs, said that oil could slide to $20 a barrel with little to stem the decline.
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