Far as I know, US refiners are not generally set-up to process sour crude? Maybe that is why it is so cheep here.
There's an extra process which makes it more expensive, but the oil is practically free. Too bad oil tanks cost so much, because it'd almost be worth it to buy 20k barrels for $25k and sit on it for a few years till the price goes back to $50 and cash out a cool million.
Heard if one has storage capacity actual oil can be bought 5-8. Extra $10 in futures is price of storage.
there are actually retired traders who buy physical oil . Then store it. every month they pay rental for storage space. Then sell it weeks / months ... later hopefully at profit. Must be a good experience. But I think finding storage space is going to be a challenge.
The bid on Wyoming sour is now -19 cents. They're asking producers to pay them to take it. https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/it...ing-clients-wyoming-sour-price-turns-negative
Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds is an early study of crowd psychology by Scottish journalist Charles Mackay, first published in 1841.[1] The book was published in three volumes: "National Delusions", "Peculiar Follies", and "Philosophical Delusions".[2] Mackay was an accomplished teller of stories, though he wrote in a journalistic and somewhat sensational style. ... In later editions, Mackay added a footnote referencing the Railway Mania of the 1840s as another "popular delusion" which was at least as important as the South Sea Bubble. Mathematician Andrew Odlyzko has pointed out, in a published lecture, that Mackay himself played a role in this economic bubble; as leader writer in the Glasgow Argus, Mackay wrote on 2 October 1845: "There is no reason whatever to fear a crash".[4][5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_Popular_Delusions_and_the_Madness_of_Crowds Quotations "Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one." "Of all the offspring of Time, Error is the most ancient, and is so old and familiar an acquaintance, that Truth, when discovered, comes upon most of us like an intruder, and meets the intruder's welcome." "How flattering to the pride of man to think that the stars on their courses watch over him, and typify, by their movements and aspects, the joys or the sorrows that await him! He, in less proportion to the universe than the all-but invisible insects that feed in myriads on a summer's leaf are to this great globe itself, fondly imagines that eternal worlds were chiefly created to prognosticate his fate." "We go out of our course to make ourselves uncomfortable; the cup of life is not bitter enough to our palate, and we distill superfluous poison to put into it, or conjure up hideous things to frighten ourselves at, which would never exist if we did not make them." "We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object, and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first." "The obnoxious hat was often snatched from his head and thrown into the gutter by some practical joker, and then raised, covered with mud, upon the end of a stick, for the admiration of the spectators, who held their sides with laughter, and exclaimed, in the pauses of their mirth, “Oh, what a shocking bad hat!” “What a shocking bad hat!”
Pretty sure article I was reading said that stuff is mainly used for asphalt and does hit the pipelines or anything. Still crazy. Up here in Canads, Western Crude(bitumen from oil sands) is trading at under 4$, mostly because they mix it with other oil for pumping it which can be extracted. It already traded at a discount and pipeline restrictions have pushed it way down before this oil crash. A barrel of fresh water is worth more.
The PROBLEM is STORAGE people. There’s no place to store it. Which the Saudis are finding out. Zero demand, permanent and temporary storage options exhausted.