sharp rise of the cost of oil on Tuesday, to the maximum this year, was caused by the fraudulent actions of the broker, which put a huge amount of applications forthe purchase of stamps Brent, that brought his company lost nearly $ 10 million, writes The Financial Times.

PVM Oil Associates, the world's largest oil broker in the OTC market, announced that he was the victim of unauthorized trading. Located in London, a private company reported that as a result of unauthorized trading, it had to close the substantial amounts of futures contracts because of the loss.

PVM informed the Office of Financial Regulation and Supervision of the UK (Financial Services Authority, FSA). However, the Board of Trade futures on the commodities the U.S. (CFTC) alleges that they did not disclose details about the fraud for several hours, despite last year's agreement between the controls on the exchange this information affects the market.

Oil traders in London and New York said that unauthorized trading due solely to a sharp jump in activity and prices in the early hours of the trading on Tuesday. From the beginning, they decided that the reason for this became geopolitical events.

The volume of trade grew quickly, as prices jumped by more than $ 2 a barrel, without apparent justification, - said a senior trader of one of New York companies.

In one hour the cost jumped from $ 71 to $ 73.5 a barrel - the highest level this year. The volume of trades futures contracts exceeded 16 million barrels per hour, twice the daily oil production by Saudi Arabia, the world's largest producer. Usually at this time of trades in the market turnover is about 500 thousand barrels.

According to traders, the broker acts alleged to explain, at least half of the unusually high volume of transactions and the remainder is attributable to the actions of the players who have played in the take-off in prices.

loss of $ 10 million will bat for the PVM, which is profit for the year ended 31 July 2008, amounted to only $ 5.6 million, noted in the article.