Cut 2.2 million barrels and oil drops below 40 bucks. Man, that must really chap those arabs asses, huh?
On Wednesday, 22 Aug 2007.- Eric Bolling, One of the Nymex largest Natural Trader ever, said on CNBC: "Ignore OPEC-They Cheat" Video. http://www.cnbc.com/id/16596357/ Quote from the article.- "âIâve been doing this 20 years and all 20 years theyâve been cheating on their output quotas. Theyâre cheating on the quota they developed last year for December. They have an output cut for February that theyâre probably going to cheat on. It doesnât matter if they meet again and promise not to cheat , theyâll still cheat.â With OPEC so 'reliably unreliable' what should investors be watching. Eric Bolling said âYou know whatâs more important than OPEC, the price of gasoline. When gasoline doesnât rally, crude oilâs not going up I donât care what OPEC says theyâre going to do. The last time oil was this price, the gas crack (or the value of the gas price over the value of the crude price) was 50% higher than it is right now. Unless gasoline rallies, crude doesnât have a shot in the you know where.â
Sweet. Iran is insolvent below ~$78. OPEC hasn't been around long enough to have corporate memory of this kind of demand destruction. Theoretically they could keep cutting production until a higher equilibrium price is achieved but the volume would be diminished. Their cash machine has gone dry for the time being. One has got to wonder if the world might see a bit less state sponsored terrorism with slashed oil revenues in these countries. Hard to pay for the jihadists when you can barely feed your people.
With all due respect, it's not as simple as you make it out to be. Understand that there are times ( like back in 1998 ) when the Saudis will open the flood-gates and pump, pump, pump . . . in order to crush the market share of other "marginal" producers . . . and in doing so "teach" them a lesson. I think that the Saudis are smart enough to know that GLOBAL demand is so incredibly soft )with all sorts of deflationary forces) that a 2.2 million cut wasn't going to support the market. Given the weakness in crude prices over the last 2 months, my guess is that E&P cap-ex budgets are being slashed left and right and the marginal producers ( and projects ) are being forced to shut-down. This will set the "stage" for less supply in the future, and a tighter market.
Relatively little of the oil we use comes from the middle east. That's a 'boogey man,' 'Orwellian' misnomer, intended to scare Americans, and keep the lever of power in the hands of those already there. Nearly all of our oil comes from here, Canada, Mexico and Venezuela.
Agree, take Russia, they are desperate for money, they are going to pump away http://www.forbes.com/markets/2008/...-markets-commodities-cx_po_1217markets13.html