If you don't link to this blog, you're a racist!
Some “ghastly” observations regarding Hitler and his quack doctor, Dr. Morell, who may have inadvertently cost Hitler his 2,000 year Reich. It can be difficult to manage a world war when consuming large quantities of strychnine, cocaine, and bull testicles.
I hate to say it but OPEC President Mohammed bin Dhaen al-Hamli’s comments sound accurate:
“Increasingly oil markets are being driven by forces beyond OPEC’s control, such as geopolitical events and the growing influence of financial investors,” Hamli said. “We are of course concerned about the high level of oil prices.”
Until we get this whole terror thing wrapped up I don’t like believing anything said by a Democrat or anyone named Mohammed. I hate to be that way, but there ya go.
I especially think the part about the “growing influence of financial investors” is on the money. When the price at the pump for a gallon of gasoline varies independently from the widely reported on price of oil, something is out of whack. When the gasoline price movements track closer to the news cycle than they do the oil market, something is out of whack.
One thing noted by al-Hamli that both lends credence to the “growing influence of financial investors” and contradicts the rest of his theory is that OPEC members already had decided last month to increase output by 500,000 barrels a day starting Nov 1.
If I am a speculator with inside information that OPEC was going to increase oil production I would buy, pump and dump and short the futures market–if I were a rat bastard, or a beaver bastard.
Assuming optimal conditions an increase in the abundance of a commodity results in a decrease in the price as the supply and demand equation is changed. The bad news is that if an increase in supply does not lower the price then demand is not being met and the price is still below optimal, a situation that would seem to indicate further increases in production would eventually start to bring prices down.
The alternative is that the price is being run up and kept at an artificially high price by George Bush and the neo-cons and their Saudi friends to pay for the Iraq war.
It would be difficult to make a living speculating in the oil market if every available storage tank was full of oil waiting for someone to buy it. If you think of the earth as a big storage tank, that’s basically what we have.
