Oil futures are falling sharply Friday after the euro tumbled to a 17-month low against the dollar of $1.2432.

At 1114 GMT, the front-month June Brent contract on London 's ICE futures exchange was $1.85 lower at $78.26 a barrel. Earlier Friday, the contract fell to a low of $77.77 a barrel.

The front-month June contract on the New York Mercantile Exchange, called West Texas Intermediate, is trading $1.26 lower at $73.14 a barrel.

But both the front-month contracts were obscuring the real impact of currency fluctuations on oil-futures prices.

June Brent was under added pressure because traders were closing long positions ahead of its expiry later Friday.

There were over 90,000 open interest positions on the front-month Brent contract Wednesday, the last time the ICE futures exchange released the data.

The June/July Brent timespread is widening as a result, adding $0.50 from Thursday to increase to $1.85 a barrel.

Meanwhile, the June WTI contract is falling less than other near-term U.S. benchmark contracts for the first time in two weeks.

June WTI prices had slumped Thursday because of record levels of oil stockpiles at Cushing , Okla. , where the crude is stored.

But the difference in price between the June and July WTI contracts has tightened by around $0.25 to around $4.35 a barrel Friday, as the market decided Thursday's selloff was overdone.

Consequently, changes in the price of the second-month contracts were more indicative of oil value.

The July Brent is down $1.28 to $80.18 a barrel at 1114 GMT, and the July WTI contract is down $1.46 to $77.51 a barrel.

"We are still pricing in the Greek sovereign debt into the markets, and that will continue to weaken the euro against the dollar," said Michael Hewson, an analyst at CMC capital Markets.

The ICE's gasoil contract for June delivery is $9.75 lower at $673 a metric ton, while Nymex gasoline for June delivery is 1.74 cents lower at 217.77 cents a gallon.

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