Crude Oil Ends Record Five-Day Climb

Crude oil futures set a new intraday record in a wild day of trading at the New York Mercantile Exchange, but ultimately both Texas Light and Brent crude closed to the downside, ending an incredible five-day climb.

WTI crude for July delivery fell $2.36 to a $130.81-a-barrel close, and Brent crude lost $2.66 to land at $230.04 a barrel.

Reformulated gasoline slid 7 cents to $3.33 a gallon, while heating oil added 5 cents at $3.96 a gallon. Near-term natural gas rose 5 cents to $11.64 per million British thermal units.

Likely contributing to oil's morning spike past $135 was a headline story by The Wall Street Journal stating that the International Energy Agency, a global energy watchdog, is preparing to cut its prior reserve estimates for the world's 400 largest producing fields.

However, oil proved unable to retain its early strength and ended up spending most of the day skirting its low. A possible cause for crude's retracement was a rare display of strength in the U.S. dollar. The U.S. Dollar Index, which measures the value of the dollar against a basket of currencies, gained 0.5% to 72.20.

It is difficult to pinpoint a reason for oil's slide, because the market is now in such a frenzied state that it doesn't react to fundamental market data in a rational way. According to Stephen Schork, publisher of the Schork Report, oil prices have recently shed their correlation with many economic attributes and data sources. "The standard trader playbook no longer applies" said Schork.