Oil could reach $200 before demand gets hit

LONDON (Reuters) – The price of oil could rise to $200 a barrel in the next two years before it starts to seriously hit demand, fund manager Tim Guinness said on Tuesday.

“I am increasingly comfortable with the analysis which says the oil price is going to have to go to $200 before demand is dampened enough,” Guinness, who is the chief investment officer of Guinness Atkinson Funds, told Reuters in an interview.


Guinness, a highly-rated fund manager who was the chairman of Investec Asset Management for four years before retiring in 2002, said he expected the spike to $200 to happen in 2010 and predicted the average price that year at around $160 a barrel.

Investment bank Goldman Sachs issued a similar prediction last week, saying oil could shoot up to $200 within the next two years as part of a “super spike” driven by poor growth in oil supplies.

Reuters