Question: Why is oil going down?Answer: Who were we getting close to?

[skip fox]

If there is no logical explanation for the drop, it MIGHT be that investigations were getting close to the real culpits behind the price hike and they figure they can get it to lower and stay down for several months/ (Then they'll get it to rise again.)


Hmmmm.

[Warpy]

1. The ban on shorting financials might have something to do with it

A lot of people needed to take profit fast on commodities in order to make up for that.

Or it could be the financials, themselves, looking for quick ways to shore up their balance sheets with real cash before the next report comes out.

Or it could be because it's the third week in July or the Moon is in Goniff, or whatever.

[Trillo]

8. Shorts would have had to "buy" to cover.

If there had been large short positions, then closing those out would have caused the price to go up, at least according to conventional market theory.

This looks more like selling than buying. Of course, appearances can be deceiving when dealing with criminals in high places.

[whistle]

2. The 2,100 speculators are already known by name and location

...the tick will be to unearth the evidence of collusion

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

3. A republican presidential campaign, perhaps?

Naw. Couldn't be.

[notadmblnd]

4. here's an even better question. Why is oil going down and the price of gas isn't?

usually if oil goes up a dollar a barrel they raise the price 10 cents, but now that it's gone down ten dollars, there's not even been one cent decrease in the price.

[Speck Tater]

11. This week's gas was made from last week's oil. There's a time lag. NT

[RaleighNCDUer]

12. But amazingly, when oil goes up, gas follows within a day or two.

Two weeks to come down, two days to go up. 12 days of excess profits.

[Speck Tater]

13. Ain't capitalism wonderful? NT

[pampango]

14. Price just dropped today in SW Ohio from $4.12 to $3.99.

Don't know about other parts of the country.

[Initech]

15. Dropped here in So Cal from $4.59 to $4.33.

I dont mind but I really want to know what the fuck is going on here.

[niyad]

5. price per barrel may be going down, but the stations in my area have been raising prices

steadily all week,

[AndyTiedye]

6. Speculators Make a Bundle on the Big Swings

rattle sabers, price goes up, announce diplomatic relations, price goes down…

[ThoughtCriminal]

7. We're past the seasonal peak

I think there is about a 15% seasonal variation, with a peak typically in spring and low in winter.

[HereSince1628]

9. The game has always been to milk consumers until they start

to demand alternatives. Then back down the price just enough to dissuade development of those alternatives.

Typically, impacted industries have put up with this because costs get passed on to consumers, and because re-organizations, pay, and benefit cutbacks in financial crises have freed them from burdensome labor costs.

Big oil has become very good at finding the price that is "all the traffic will bear" this since the 1970s.

[JackRiddler]

10. Last week: "War with Iran." This week: "Possible rapprochement."

The speculators profiteer to the tune of billions out of the peoples' pockets, but all they do from day to day is follow the news. The crisis of the dollar, the insane and murderous adventures of a wobbly empire, the reality that peak oil will arrive: these are not the artificial creations of the speculators or the oil companies, these are the reality of the age we live in. Curbing the speculators will not solve these problems, though of course I support curbing the speculators.

Oil is tied in with banks that insure the price fluctuations; they are interlocked to the point of indistinguishability, roughly the same rich people control the two industries. Money is made in both directions. Reaching $147 and then dropping $14 is not a "plunge," it is an expectable fluctuation at that very high range. A fall of the same proportion from $55 to $49 would have been a blip in the media coverage (and this thread probably would not have been started). You may remember a similar huge "plunge" was reported in the oil price a few weeks ago, before it went back up.

Let's see where it goes next week.

I want to be wrong!