A SUMMARY of trading in key commodities markets overseas: Oil prices have fallen on profit-taking after enjoying healthy gains at the end of last week following encouraging US jobs data, analysts said. Brent North Sea crude for delivery in March on Monday shed 76 US cents to $US116 a barrel in London midday deals. The contract had reached a near five-month high at $US117.07 a barrel on Friday. New York's main contract, light sweet crude for March, dropped 95 US cents to $US96.82 a barrel in Monday trade. Platinum has climbed to the highest point in almost four months on Monday amid worries about continued supply shortfalls after the top producer of the metal said it swung to a loss last year. Base metals closed mostly modestly higher on the London Metal Exchange (LME), as the complex widely held onto upbeat sentiment generated by positive economic data readings in earlier sessions. At the close of open-outcry trading on Monday, flagship metal LME three-month copper closed 0.1 per cent higher at $US8,300 a metric ton. The complex had carried through confidence early in the session from positive manufacturing data from the US Friday and also a slightly firmer nonmanufacturing China PMI reading delivered over the weekend. Although prices wavered into negative territory over Monday's European session, with some metals remaining in the red to the close, most managed to sustain gains, with Monday being LME copper's sixth straight session of gains. This was after US economic data showed factory orders in December rose 1.8 per cent boosted mainly by defence spending. Orders for durable goods, which are items meant to last at least three years, rose 4.3 per cent, revised down slightly from a 4.6 per cent gain.