NEW DELHI: Brent crude oil prices have more than doubled from its low of $27.88 a barrel recorded in January to hover near $55 a barrel and may pose a risk to the broader market, in general, and select sectors, in particular, if the trend continues in 2017.Crude oil prices have shot up 15 per cent in last two weeks and Indian consumers may soon have to cough up more, though the fuel price hike may happen in instalments, media reports said.Analysts said public sector oil marketing companies might need to raise petrol and diesel prices by up to Rs 6 a litre when they review fuel prices on December 15.Crude oil prices rose to an 18-month high on Monday, though they slipped a bit later in the day. US crude futures settled 2.6 per cent higher at $52.83 a barrel, while Brent crude futures rose by $1.36 to $55.69 a barrel.Brent prices have been firming up this month after the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) and other exporters led by Russia over the weekend reached their first deal since 2001 to cut output by almost 1.8 million barrels a day to reduce oversupply.Rising crude prices are making market participants worried about the possible impact of rising crude oil prices on the Indian equity market, the broader economy as well as various sectors that use crude oil as a raw material. The year 2017 looks bullish for oil prices as the oil-surplus market is likely to turn into deficit, experts said.Even though crude oil prices are trading at comfortable levels, but a steady rise in prices could well hurt India’s current account deficit. Crude oil accounts for almost 80 per cent of India’s import bill.Analyst estimates suggest every dollar increase in crude oil price will cause India’s import bill to rise by nearly half a billion dollars ($500 million).But it is not all that bad right now for the domestic economy despite a steady rise in crude oil prices, experts said. For the past couple of years, India has managed to take care of crude requirements with Russia. India has also signed long-term crude supply agreements with some of the African nations.“After December 2017, our bilateral trade with Iran opened up as the oil exporter signed a key nuclear deal with the P5+1 group of world powers - the US, UK, France, China and Russia plus Germany,” Gaurang Shah, Head-Investment Strategist, Geojit BNP Paribas, told ETMarkets.com.“India’s energy requirement today is at a comfortable level than earlier years. It remains to be seen if crude oil can sustain at $55-60 a barrel level. The reason being at prices above $55 a barrel, crude oil from America could become viable in terms of exports and supply to global crude market. As of now, there is no reason for worry,” he said.The price of international crude oil price of the Indian basket, as computed and published by the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell (PPAC) under the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas , stood at $54.42, or Rs 3,677.60 a barrel on Monday.It has remained above $51 a barrel on most days this fortnight, compared with the November average of $44.46 a barrel.From a market standpoint, there are plenty of reasons to worry as higher crude oil prices will hurt the margins for various companies, leading to higher inflation and capping any meaningful upside in the domestic stock market."Rising crude prices are making market participants worried, especially when the year 2017 looks to be bullish for oil prices. In the current economic scenario, India is witnessing a weak demand scenario which is evident after second quarter GDP growth turned out to be weaker than projected,” D K Aggarwal, Chairman and MD, SMC Investments and Advisors, told ETMarkets.com.“It becomes somewhat worrisome for the markets that firming up of crude prices can jack up input costs and drag profitability of the manufacturing industry, which has limited ability to pass on the higher cost given the weak demand conditions,” he said.Aggarwal said higher crude prices would also push up the consumer price inflation which would be a threat to the desired level of 5 percent by the Q4 2016 -2017 of the Reserve Bank of India and may act as a hindrance to cut the interest rate.Earnings growth was hard to come by even when crude oil prices were trading at record lows in 2016. Now with higher prices, margins could well take a hit, analysts said. Crude oil prices are directly or indirectly correlated with the performance of most sectors.Sectors and stocks that have limited ability to pass on the higher input costs may see erosion in margins and would consequently lead to a fall in valuations, analysts said.“Refiners and the lubricants industry would take the direct hit, while paints, adhesives and plastics sectors will take an indirect hit because some of the byproducts of crude refining are key raw materials for them,” Tushar Pendharkar, Head of Research, Right Horizons Investment Advisory Services, told ETMarkets.com."Refiners will take the maximum hit on expectation of lower refining margins, while paint ( Asian Paints , Berger, Kansai Nerolac and Akzo Nobel), adhesives (Pidilite Industries) and plastics ( Nilkamal , Supreme Industries) sectors could underperform in anticipation of an increase in input cost,” he said.Shah of Geojit BNP Paribas said tyre, paint industry, aviation sectors, oil-marketing companies (OMCs) apart from two-wheeler and four-wheeler firms are the major sectors whose fortunes are closely linked to crude oil prices.