The May crude oil futures contract in NYMEX ACCESS trade at 11:15 Tokyo time on Tuesday was at $65.68 per barrel (bbl), up 13cts from the closing price in New York on Monday while the May Brent contract in ICE After Hours Trading was at $70.19/bbl, up 7cts. The opening prices in Asia stock markets increased from the previous day as press reports that Steven Mnuchin, US Secretary of the Treasury, considered visiting to China for trade negotiations led to views that tensions around trades between US and China would ease. “Investors bought crude futures amid a stronger risk-taking mood in the Asia market,” Tsuyoshi Ueno, a senior economist at NLI Research Institute said. The increase in prices were, however, limited. Ueno added that investors were likely to take profit if WTI prices were over $65.00/bbl. The Nikkei Stock Average gained 375.59 points from Monday to 21,141.69. Meanwhile, the US dollar traded at 105.70 against the yen versus 105.07 on Monday evening Tokyo time.

RECX-22 index for Tuesday was at 102.55 points, up 0.37 points from Monday.