Oil under pressure after dollar jumps on stronger U.S. jobs data
Benchmark Brent oil gave back some of its early gains while U.S. crude turned negative on Friday after the dollar jumped on strong U.S. jobs data for February, raising fears of a sooner-than-expected rate hike in the world’s largest economy.
Brent’s front-month contract was up 41 cents at $60.89 a barrel by 8:38 a.m. EST (1338 GMT), after rising as high as $61.30 earlier.
U.S. crude was down 20 cents at $50.56 a barrel.
U.S. employment accelerated in February and the jobless rate fell to 5.5 percent, signs that could encourage the Federal Reserve to consider hiking interest rates in June.
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