Oil futures raced to another all-time high on the New York Mercantile Exchange Wednesday as traders continued to focus on concerns that worldwide supply pressures are unlikely to ease.
Crude oil for September delivery was recently trading up 5 cents to $44.20 a barrel after touching $44.28 earlier -- a new high for the 21-year-old contract. Oil is up more than a third from a year ago and has spent most of the past month above $40.
The latest spike has come amid generally dour communication from OPEC, which previously pledged to increase oil output to meet demand that could be as much as 2 million barrels-a-day higher this year than it was in 2003. On Tuesday, news organizations quoted OPEC's president warning that Saudi Arabia would be unable to add significant supply to the world market in the near term.
The country previously pledged it would boost supplies to 9.5 million barrels a day in July.
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