1.   Declining global production and rising demand drove prices higher.

2.   Therefore price competition between them for the right to sell to the retailers would drive price to Marginal cost.

3.   With prices now at their lowest for two years, motorists are no doubt hoping the competition will drive prices down even further.

4.   Also driving prices higher is concern that a typhoon in the Pacific, Keith, that was just upgraded from a tropical storm could damage crops in Thailand.

5.   Also driving prices higher was robust demand from traders who use historic price trends to determine future trading patterns, analysts said.

6.   Also driving electricity prices higher today was the continued shutdown of a nuclear reactor in California, which reduced supply, Crowley said.

7.   Also driving prices higher was speculation that the Colombian Coffee Growers Federation is buying coffee on its internal market to satisfy export contracts.

8.   Although commodity prices have been driven higher, the slowdown in the domestic economy to a more sustainable rate could contain these inflation pressures, Clarke said.

9.   Among several analysts, however, there is a growing consensus that heavy cash inflows into mutual funds are driving stock prices higher.

10.   Among those controls are limits on trades by individuals and systems to monitor trades when the price is being driven by the actions of one trader.