Oil Falls to Near $83 a Barrel
Oil fell to an almost eight-month low near $83 a barrel in early trading Monday, following Friday’s downgrade of a U.S. credit rating, Bloomberg reported.
Crude futures fell more than $3.50 to as low as $83.18 a barrel in pre-market New York Mercantile Exchange trading, from Friday’s $86.88 closing price, Bloomberg said.
Oil prices fell almost $9 a barrel last week as equities markets plunged, and are down 8% this year.
Standard & Poor’s, one of three credit rating agencies, downgraded the United States’ credit rating to AA+, one notch below the top AAA rating, late Friday. The other two ratings agencies, Fitch and Moody’s, held the U.S. credit rating at AAA.
The Department of Energy will release its weekly survey of diesel and gasoline pump prices Monday afternoon in Washington.
