Oil rose toward $80 a barrel in thin holiday trade on Thursday, poised for the biggest annual climb in a decade, a year after posting huge falls as the global economic crisis sapped demand.
Oil prices on Thursday hit $80 a barrel for the first time in seven weeks as the dollar sank on the final day of the year.
Biotech stocks took a turn for the worse in 2009 as the major players dealt with regulatory, manufacturing and political issues as well as a deep recession, but their fortunes could turn in 2010 if they get added patent protection.
Agriculture futures were mostly higher early Thursday on the Chicago Board of Trade. Wheat for March delivery gained 2.25 cents to $5.47 a bushel, while March corn rose 1.25 cents to $4.15 a bushel and soybeans for January delivery jumped 7 cents to $10.515 a bushel.
Nebraska had 6 percent fewer hogs and pigs on Dec. 1 than it did a year earlier. The U.S. Department of Agriculture said Wednesday that the state’s total inventory of hogs and pigs fell to 3.15 million head.
Oil prices rallied for a seventh straight session and neared $80 a barrel, as the market eyed the biggest annual gain in a decade.
The Environmental Protection Agency said New York regulators have much more work to do on proposed regulations that have already held up gas drilling in the state’s part of the massive Marcellus Shale formation for more than a year.