Not what we want to here. We want to here, oil is going to the moon hop on board enjoy the ride it will last forever.
"Speculation" is way too much of an encompassing term. I think someone should hold a meeting, determine a term for legit speculation (ie Iran-Israel war will be detrimental, so oil price goes up) -vs- whatever the futures and commodities markets have done over the past 6 months-year.
It's int'g cuzz BW had an article In Praise of Speculation: http://www.businessweek.com/lifesty...76.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_top+story
Excellent Commentary , Shoeshineboy ........................................................................... Sammy Sosa once shined shoes.... Hey that's right....and they do deserve praise because they provide an important part of price discovery..... And they deserve appreciation because they survive whether price spikes up or down..... When someone like Michael Steinhardt says that the answer to the question of why oil prices are where they are, and that to just pawn it off to speculators is too simple.....one should pay attention to what Steinhardt has to say....as he is one of the best minds on WS..... Thus if some of the very best minds in the country are still paundering as to exactly why, then you bet the answer requires a very articulate approach.... However.....there is a set of reasons as to why....and one of the reasons is money chasing oil contracts.....no, this is not going to be exempt from the equation....nor are Bush/Cheney policies going to be exempt....nor is a weak dollar policy going to be exempt.....nor is actual supply/demand going to be exempt....nor is the fact that the oil welfare states will to be excluded from future revenue going to be exempt.....nor is the gradualness of continual daily oil related potential shortage due to hurricanes or militants going to be exempt....nor is a lack of an serious American Energy policy going to be exempt.....the list goes on..... As you can already see....there are going to be many Xi's in the equation.... But yes.....there are answers to the question as to why prices have moved as they have.....it is not by magic.....
Here's some interesting info. Whether you actually believe any of this or not is immaterial since you at least get to look at Poppy Harlow for a few minutes: http://money.cnn.com/video/ft/#/video/fortune/2008/07/08/fortune.prins.oil.fortune