Energy markets, oil & gasoline prices

nce · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 4:48 pm **Posts:** 1543

The greed of oil producers and traders could tip the rest of the world back into recession

Andy Hall, a British-born oil trader based outside New York, personally pocketed over $100m last year. That was his reward for astutely predicting in 2003 that oil prices would soar towards $200 a barrel. Just before prices hit $147 in July 2008, however, Hall bailed out. The 58-year-old ex-BP trader feared the consequences once Manhattan"s banks began crashing. Record oil prices, he foresaw, were tipping the world into recession. Yet, as oil tumbled towards $32, the global economic crisis sparked Hall"s appetite for more profits. Eagerly, he began speculating in New York and London that prices would eventually boomerang back towards $200. So far they are hovering around $70, but Hall is convinced that once the recovery begins and the demand for oil increases, oil prices and his profits will rocket up again.

Source

nce · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 4:48 pm **Posts:** 1543

HOUSTON Trying to acquire a foothold in the American oil patch, a Chinese company is closing in on a deal to buy stakes in a few drilling leases in the Gulf of Mexico from a Norwegian company, an executive close to the talks said.

The prospective purchase would not do much to quench China s huge and growing thirst for energy, which makes it the second-leading consumer of oil after the United States. But such an oil acquisition would be symbolically important as the first by China in the United States, coming four years after the Chinese company s $18.5 billion bid for the American oil company Unocal collapsed under pressure from Congress.

Source

nce · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 4:48 pm **Posts:** 1543

The new Interior Department looks into a move to lock in beneficial royalties and regulations for companies with leases on public lands -- denounced by some as a massive giveaway to the oil industry.

Reporting from Washington - The Obama Interior Department is reviewing a decision made by the Bush administration in its final days that attempted to lock in lucrative royalty rates and favorable regulations for oil companies holding leases for oil-shale development on public lands.

The decision, which came in the form of amendments to existing leases, drew little public notice at the end of the Bush administration in January. But since then, congressional watchdogs, environmental groups and state officials in Colorado, where most of the leases are located, have denounced the amendments as a massive giveaway to the oil industry.

Source

rakiguune373 · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 7:37 am **Posts:** 1792

Oil is a global commodity, although, to be sure, it s whereabouts are distributed unequally across the globe. Nevertheless, a disruption in supply anywhere in the world has ramifications for consumers everywhere. The damage caused by such a disruption in any given country depends upon that particular countries dependence on oil, and benefits and losses upon the ratio between imported and exported quantities. In the oil markets, seemingly minor disruptions in the supply of oil can result in a drastic spike in prices; for instance, in Oil ShockWave, a crisis simulation by Securing America s Future Energy (SAFE), an approximate four percent drop in global supply resulted in a 177% increase in the price of oil (from $58 a barrel to $161 a barrel).

Source

rakiguune373 · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 7:37 am **Posts:** 1792

Oil prices pushed near the top of their recent range this week, and the usual suspects trotted out on the TV to tell us why this rally couldn"t last. And on the face of it, their argument seems to make sense. It boils down to ...

1. Crude has been trapped in the same range since June.
2. U.S. oil demand is lackluster at best.
3. There is plenty of oil in storage.

Source

haqoums · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:09 am **Posts:** 1455

It seems that the world may hit peak oil production in 2020, which might bring an end to the "Lalalalala, I can"t hear you!" attitude that world governments are currently employing. If only it was in 2120 then no one would care as we"ll all be dead by then. Plus we have a cutlery update and some alarming accounting about the war in Afghanistan.

Source

haqoums · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 11:09 am **Posts:** 1455

The question on many stock market participants" minds these days is how much longer the current rally will last. Most of us are sane enough to realize that the good fortunes bestowed upon us by the markets since March will be taken away again at some point in the not too distant future. The question is only, when will the good times end

Paraphrasing a popular Russian saying: If I would know that, I would live in Monte Carlo. What I can tell you with much certainly is that for most of us the demise will come just as suddenly and unexpectedly as did the reprieve. And when the markets fall this time, so will the oil prices.

Source

udavaxci · **Joined:** Fri Apr 03, 2009 12:26 am **Posts:** 1678

...The two authors have the same theme -- how Americans will have to give up traveling, abandon eating foods that come from great distances away and find new ways to work. These books, listed on the non-fiction book lists, amaze me because they truly are fictional works. Admittedly they are based on reasonable premises, but they are largely speculation about how the world of the future will unfold.

Source

nce · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 4:48 pm **Posts:** 1543

Author writes about how life will different with more expensive oil

If you are investing just $10 or $100 million, facts are more valuable than polemics of any stripe.

So when I opened a slender book, Why Your World is About to Get A Whole Lot Smaller, by a former business economist named Jeff Rubin, I was prepared for a dreary polemic from another hack ideologue prepared to ignore the facts to advance an argument blessed by Milton Friedman or perhaps Karl Marx.

Source

nce · **Joined:** Thu Apr 02, 2009 4:48 pm **Posts:** 1543

Peak oil advocates Matthew Simmons and Kjell Aleklett say Daniel Yergin has the future of energy all wrong.

Daniel Yergin muses that oil, celebrating its 150th birthday this year, has never been in better shape (It"s Still the One, September/October 2009). He argues that the world"s endowment of oil is larger than ever, despite a century and a half of constant use and a world consumption of more than 85 million barrels daily.

How terrific the world"s outlook would be if Yergin"s argument had even a touch of reality! Sadly, however, if one ignores opinion and simply adheres to well-documented facts, it quickly becomes clear that his assertions are utterly without substance.

Source

Forumchem - Forum with AI(ALICE BOT & HAL9000) and TTS

Energy markets, oil & gasoline prices

Who is online