ah, I was just joking with shopster. The old, "Everybody wants to sell but nobody wants to buy." Might be true, but somebody is buying. Maybe just to close out a short. All these old market sayings make sense if you don't think about them too much.
=========== Good points, Frank, on 50 day moving average. Some dont like that 50dma/TA because many chart services have slightly different data points for 50 day/ema..../50 day sma... I like it myself For fun i read fundamentals, not that is as helpful,as a 50 dma. But as one trader shorted Citigroup, smiled, & said ''fundamentals win in the end''. Sure the longest term trend is still uptrending.But One [1 ]year of data may contain lower cash market prices.And in an election year , longs may simply have more risk. Not a prediction. Even the longest of the long term bulls, may privately admit the 50 dma & one year chart looks like parabolic time price selling
unless you have a place to store a thousand barrels of crude, it is exremely difficult to be a long term bull. The roll out almost forces you to trade from the long side buying dips and getting flat on rallies. Buy and hold just doesn't work for a small trader like me. If USO can't do it, neither can I. Like you say, fundamentals are nice in a cash market, but in this case about worthless in CL.
Just an FYI. That sharp downside move in crude is not a one off phenomena. Go back & check your front month charts for May 1st of 2011 & you'll discover that the same move happened last year within 5 calendar days of this year's market rip. Both times for whatever reasons crude ran up from the beginning of year in part for the spring seasonal demand plus your soup du jour risk premium (pick your favorite global tension) etc. Also, both times the market was offering some real cheap put gamma roughly 2 weeks to expiration. After those moves those options were priced "thick" like ATM premiums. Whatever the reason for slamming it, they almost slammed it on cue.