Oil prices climbed further on Friday evening as traders bought back into the market, while Ecuador's suspension of crude exports added to fears over tight global supply.
New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in September, jumped $1.28 to $64.55 a barrel. In London, the price of Brent North Sea crude oil for delivery in October gained $1.39 to $63.79.
Supply concerns have heightened in recent weeks by problems at US refineries, pushing New York futures to a historic high of $67.10 last Friday, and to $66.85 in London on Monday. Prices had lost as much as $5 a barrel since hitting those record levels - but regained some ground on Friday as buyers returned.
Traders were absorbing news that Ecuador had halted exports amid violent protests in two oil-rich Amazon provinces - where striking workers and the local population have taken over three dozen oil wells to force negotiations for a bigger share of oil revenues.
Ecuador is South America's fifth largest oil producer and more than half of its exports go to the US. The country normally produces 200,000 barrels of oil a day. Ecuador's President Alfredo Palacio said that production by the facilities of the state-run oil group Petroecuador - 35 of which have been occupied by protesters - had dropped from 210,000 to 30,000 barrels a day, costing the country $30m a day in lost revenues.
Oil traders were also absorbing a report from Goldman Sachs in which the US finance house revised upward its forecasts for oil prices, citing a lack of investment in the sector. The bank raised its forecasts for New York crude in 2005 from $53.50 to $67. And it predicted a $68 average in 2006, compared with its previous forecast of $55.
