NEW YORK — Crude-oil futures swung wildly Monday, rising to a record and then tumbling as investors wrestled with whether they should put stock in Saudi Arabia’s promise to boost production. Retail gas prices rose to a record $4.08 a gallon.
Light, sweet crude for July delivery fell 25 cents to settle at $134.61 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange after earlier soaring to a trading record of $139.89. Earlier, the price dropped as low as $132.84.
With little in the way of news to explain oil’s turnabout, analysts pointed to Saudi Arabia’s weekend decision to boost production and to today’s expiration of crude options, which are agreements to buy or sell futures at higher or lower prices.
Trading is often volatile in the days immediately preceding options expiration.
“That could be the cause of some of the volatility today,” said James Cordier, president of Tampa, Fla.- based trading firms Liberty Trading Group and .
Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil producer, told U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon over the weekend it would boost oil output by 200,000 barrels a day, or 2 percent, from June to July. In May, the kingdom raised production by 300,000 barrels a day.
A sense that the Saudis may be getting serious about boosting output could be growing among some investors. Still, many analysts believe the boost in Saudi output is too little to make much difference.
“Saudi Arabia’s proposed output addition will only go some way in offsetting the significant output losses in other OPEC nations like Nigeria,” Barclays Capital analyst Kevin Norrish said in a research note.
