[Bas]

$98.46

[Carlhole]

Let's see, we've got (1) a hugely weakening US dollar,
(2) institutional and hedge fund money moving away from the Ground Zero of the US mortgage meltdown and into other investments, (3) fear over conflicts in the Middle East,

How much of this is actually due to supply and demand considerations? I mean, that's what we here at PO.com are most interested in.

I've seen estimates that #1 above is about 30% of the price move from 1999. Is that right?

#2 could be $15 or so...

Are we watching a true Peak Oil driven market or an energy bubble?

[Starvid]

No matter which is true, it will raise PO awareness in a huge way.

We had the ASPO chairman on TV a few days ago, on the evening news.

The voice over introduction: 5 years ago oil experts convened at Uppsala university and figured out oil was running out. The oil industry laughed at them, as oil would supposedly last for ever. But now 5 years later, no one is laughing. Fields are declining fast and the new ones found are too small to make a difference. In 5 years oil will peak and in 20 years the entire world will suffer from harsh oil shortages.

In Swedish, but still pretty understandable: http://tv4nyheterna.se/2.139?videoId=1.199571

Ends with the ominous:
- [in 2030 Norwegian oil] will be almost gone?
- It will be almost gone.

[yull]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Carlhole', 'L')et's see, we've got (1) a hugely weakening US dollar,
(2) institutional and hedge fund money moving away from the Ground Zero of the US mortgage meltdown and into other investments, (3) fear over conflicts in the Middle East,

How much of this is actually due to supply and demand considerations? I mean, that's what we here at PO.com are most interested in.

I've seen estimates that #1 above is about 30% of the price move from 1999. Is that right?

#2 could be $15 or so...

Are we watching a true Peak Oil driven market or an energy bubble?

[Bas]

$98.60 an hour ago (it's now back to $98,20)

[whereagles]

well, indonesian tapis is showing above $100 now

http://www.upstreamonline.com/market_da ... kets_crude

[Carlhole]

Where's the bubble?

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MarketWatch', '[')b]Commentary: Oil and stocks can't both go up in tandem forever

It used to be taken as axiomatic that oil and equities moved inversely. As recently as five years ago, for example, an academic study found that an investor could have easily beaten a buy-and-hold in the stock market over the previous three decades by following a simple rule that calls for being out of stocks whenever oil, in the previous calendar month, rose by at least 5%.

And yet somebody forgot to refresh the stock market about this axiom. Though crude oil keeps barreling higher, fast closing in on the $100 mark, the stock market hardly seems unfazed. Tuesday was no exception: Crude oil futures rose 3% on the day, and yet, far from falling, the Dow Jones Industrial Average turned in a triple-digit gain.

It seems fair to say that these trends can't keep going forever.
But, if that's the case, which market is going to blink first - stocks or oil?

The nearly-universal consensus among the nearly 200 newsletters monitored by the Hulbert Financial Digest, as well as from investment-oriented blogs I read: Stock investors are in denial right now. Investors in the oil market, in contrast, are on solid ground.

But...

[Revi]

Well we're not up to $100 yet, but we aren't too far away either:

http://www.bloomberg.com/energy/

Around $98 last time I looked.

[morph]

tapis blend is at $100.36!!

[Bas]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Drifter', '[')b]Damn. Talk about volatility:

[Starvid]

Oil at only $96, it's cheeeeeap again!

[Armageddon]

From CNN

While oil has been expected to test the $100 mark for several days, one analyst said crossing the psychologically important threshold may prove a challenge.

Many hedge funds bought when prices were around $80 a barrel, and many may want to cash out and take the $16 or $18 profit without waiting around to see if the $100 level can be broken, according to Peter Beutel, an oil analyst at Cameron Hanover.

"We certainly would not risk $16 or more for the last $2 or $3 a barrel," Beutel wrote in a research note. "Because of this, we have to expect to see a number of professional traders take profits before we actually see $100."

I figured $100.00 would have resistance due to this.

[eastbay]

Yeah. Resistance. Nice term.

Kinda like how magma faces resistance as it moves upwards.

[Bas]

it might "self propel" to $110 or so once we do break a 100 though.

[DantesPeak]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Drifter', 'W')ell, that didn't last long. Oil is climbing again. $97.56

[whereagles]

natural gas looks cheap now... hedge 5000 bucks of it on 10 years and you're bound to make a bucketload