Atlantic storm pushes oil price higher

The first named storm of the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season pushed oil prices to their highest in nearly two months for a while on Monday.

Tropical storm Alex moved over the Yucatan peninsula halting about 80 percent of Mexico’s crude exports, which mainly go to US refineries.

Some platforms in the Gulf of Mexico were evacuated.

But analysts said the oil market is oversupplied right now and provided any disruptions are short-lived prices should not come under too much pressure.

Forecasters expect an active hurricane season possibly matching 2005, the record-breaker that spawned Hurricane Katrina.

As of Monday Alex was not threatening the capture and clean up from BP’s massive Gulf of Mexico spill.

For the first time the Mississippi coast has been effected by that disaster. Large patches of thick oil started washing ashore at the weekend and locals criticised a lack of clean-up efforts.

BP has said it has so far spend around 2.25 billion euros on capping the gushing well, clean-up and compensation.

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