Monday afternoon, a hike past $83 per barrel was seen in crude-oil futures in Asia to reach a novel 15-month high. The rise in price occurred after a plunge in the U. S. dollar enhanced dollar-denominated commodities prices and Chinese data displayed stern demand for crude imports in December.

The electronic trading on Globex witnessed crude for February delivery reaching to a high of $83.67 per barrel, which was the strongest intraday level the contract has experienced since October 2008. Last seen, it was at $83.39, up 64 cents.

The contract grew by 9 cents, or 0.1 % on Friday to $82.75 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange to log a gain of 4.3% for the week.

The month of December saw the Chinese imports taking a hike by 55.9%, with the help of a climb in crude-oil imports to a record monthly high of 21.26 million tons. A climb by 17.7% was seen in exports from the same time a year ago.

Ben Potter, a research analyst at IG Markets, specified that the China data has provided a big boost up to commodities. He continued that expectations were smashed by the import and export numbers.

Gold futures touched their strongest intraday level in more than a month by jumping by as much as $24 an ounce in electronic trade Monday morning in Asia.

Crude-oil prices were also helped by ongoing weakness in the dollar after discouraging U. S. jobs data on Friday, with the dollar buying 92.19 yen, down from 92.49 late Friday in North American trading.

Christopher Ecclestone, a mining strategist at Global Hunter Securities, said, "Dollar carry trade is back on. The liquidity is looking for the next best thing and its hard assets."