Crude-oil futures rose in Asian trade Monday as the excessive drop in oil prices in recent weeks sparked some buying interest and short-covering among investors before the end of the year, traders said.

On the New York Mercantile Exchange, light, sweet crude futures for delivery in February traded at $58.09 a barrel at 0352 GMT, up $0.96 in the Globex electronic session. February Brent crude on London's ICE Futures exchange rose $1.16 to $62.54 a barrel.

The price of Nymex crude fell 2.23% last week for the fourth consecutive week. During those four weeks Nymex lost 26.13%--the largest percentage decline for that time period since the week ended Dec. 26, 2008. Brent crude fell 1.24% last week and has also dropped for the last four consecutive weeks, losing 23.62% of its value.

On Sunday, Gulf oil officials defended the decision of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries last month to keep its production ceiling intact, blaming non-OPEC producers for the current oil market glut.

Saudi Arabia's oil minister, Ali al-Naimi, blamed a lack of coordination among non-OPEC producers, along with speculators and misleading information, for the price slump. He was speaking at an energy conference in Abu Dhabi.

Oil prices have nosedived since OPEC decided on Nov. 27 to keep its production ceiling unchanged.

KBC Energy Economics said it expected absolute energy prices to remain lower through the end of 2015.

Meanwhile, money managers continued to extend their net-long positions, betting that prices will rise. Money managers raised bullish bets on oil with a net-long position of 217,723 contracts through Dec. 16, up 13.8% from the week earlier, CFTC data showed.

Citi Futures said the strongest bullish argument for crude oil at the moment is that it looks cheap after a protracted price drop.

Nymex reformulated gasoline blendstock for January--the benchmark gasoline contract--rose 306 points to $1.5901 a gallon, while January diesel traded at $1.9868, 246 points higher.

ICE gasoil for January changed hands at $562.00 a metric ton, up $13.25 from Friday's settlement.

--Summer Said and Sarah Kent contributed to this article.

Write to Eric Yep at eric.yep@wsj.com

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