Oil rose above $78 a barrel today amid an influx of speculative fund money and tightening crude supplies from the North Sea.
London Brent climbed to a fresh 11-month high of $78.12 in earlier trade - just 53 cents away a record peak of $78.65 last August. Earlier the benchmark was trading up 46 cents at $78.03.
US crude was up 29 cents at $74.22 a barrel, close to 11-month highs but still well below its record high of $78.40 set in July 2006.
Seasonal maintenance on North Sea oilfields, coupled with unanticipated outages, has helped extend oil's near three-week rally, lifting Brent by more than $7 since late June.
Speculative flows into commodities have also fuelled the run-up, driven in part by fears a rush by US refiners to produce enough gasoline this summer will leave the world's second-biggest consumer short of heating fuel in the winter.