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NoAngst wrote:Unfortunately, it's not all up to OPEC. The whole world economy is in the doldrums. Demand is depressed and there are no signs that increased demand for oil is in the offing. But if world demand picks, prices will ineluctably shoot up with or without OPEC intervention. You don't believe, just go listen/watch any business news outlet. They're constantly talking about reserves and demand and very little about OPEC.

The crude oil price has little to do with actual demand.

A huge portion of the price is just from wall street monkeys speculating on commodity prices based on the ebbs and flows of the world of finances (interest rates, political tensions, bullish/bearishness of commodities etc).

I myself have speculated in this I can only imagine that big investment banks are doing this to a much larger extant.

[quote="Itrah"][quote="NoAngst"]Unfortunately, it's not all up to OPEC. The whole world economy is in the doldrums. Demand is depressed and there are no signs that increased demand for oil is in the offing. But if world demand picks, prices will ineluctably shoot up with or without OPEC intervention. You don't believe, just go listen/watch any business news outlet. They're constantly talking about reserves and demand and very little about OPEC.[/quote]

The crude oil price has little to do with actual demand.

A huge portion of the price is just from wall street monkeys speculating on commodity prices based on the ebbs and flows of the world of finances (interest rates, political tensions, bullish/bearishness of commodities etc).

I myself have speculated in this I can only imagine that big investment banks are doing this to a much larger extant.[/quote]

Speculators are definitely responsible for price hikes/drops but in the long-run commodity prices are determined by global supply/demand. Right now, there is huge demand slump due to global economic slump.

Its not so much as the speculators, but the abundance of oil every where. United States digging oil and using its reserves has made the oil become something less valuable than it was before. The key to prices is its value. If everyone has oil, oil seizes to be gold. In the olden days--Saudis and Iran held strong monopoly on oil sales. Soon--oil will be useless as America will lead the way to energy driven cars. What will happen to the Saudis taloow--then?

There is actually no oil glut and Peak Oil has already been reached back in 2005-06. That is why prices spiked and up to then economically unfeasible unconventional oil sources such as shale oil, tar sands, off shore, etc. began to be utilized.

The world is simply undergoing a major economic slump thanks to neoliberal economics.

Thats not true, the US is doing pretty well. Unemployment now stands at 5%, the lowest it has been for a long time. Europe for the most part has recovered also.

If you remember the global economic crisis in '09 or '10, oil prices were much higher than they are now. And there was even less demand for oil 5yrs ago.

Lower oil prices are gonna be with us regardless of global economic outlook. The two aren't interlinked.