[evilgenius]

What do you guys think about the on the spot heavy oil upgraders, IVAN and Genoil are the two that stand out prominently? Do they have the edge in this space or does that belong to bigger fish? I am concerned that the credit disaster will kill any company that hasn't already got its tech together. I am not sure there will be capital to develop new tech as PO develops.

[MOCKBA]

Here is an interesting graph to think about
I kinda feel right now we are right between "Denial" and "Return to normal" when it comes to stock market

[rockdoc123]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'w')hy are the motives of Opec any different than the motives of some of these smaller oil/gas companies etc? Again, I will not argue this point on this thread, but I would like to hear how you see differences where I see similarities.

[MrBill]

rockdoc123 I sat next to a guy on a plane once from the old VCX and he explained to me in detail exactly what you describe.

Junior mining companies lease a piece of land and issue a whole bunch of penny stocks then they put out a press release. The stock jumps. Then they drill a few test holes and put out another press release. The stock jumps again. Then they announce plans to drill more holes. The stock jumps again. Think BRE-X.

All the while it is taking these guys out of their penny stocks at a profit. And if they ever get lucky and actually find something, asset stripping is not uncommon. Sell off the productive lease to another private company.

It is a real mug's game. My wife lost quite a nice nest egg before I met her in a Canadian gold mine. A hot tip from a freind who was a broker at the time. That money in German Blue Chips, more her risk profile, would have done nicely since the mid-80s. Nice guy, eh?

[ostap]

Speculators are often (wrongly) blamed for high commodity prices. There is an easy way to assess the influence of speculators on commodity prices using the weekly Commitment of Traders (COT) reports. These reports contain information on the positioning of commercial and non-commercial (or “speculative”) traders on futures markets.

The distinction between commercial and non-commercial traders is probably not perfect, and, for each commodity, the COT report only measures the positioning on one single futures exchange (there are many other exchanges and financial instruments to speculate on a commodity). The COT positions thus do not represent the totality of all speculative forces. However, they are probably correlated with the totality of all speculative forces and can thus serve as an indicator.

A scatter plot of oil prices and net long positions of speculators reveals some interesting things:



First, net positions of speculators and oil prices are indeed correlated at higher frequencies. For illustration purposes, the last three big swings in oil prices and net commercial positions are highlighted in different colours: red (from $53 in November 05 to $71 in May 06), green (from $71 in May 06 to $51 in January 07) and blue (from $51 in January 07 to $75 in July 07). Speculation can thus be linked to price movements of around 30 weeks and 20$ per barrel (from high to low). Assuming that the equilibrium prices were between the observed highs and lows, speculation is associated with price divergences from the equilibrium price of around 15 weeks and $10 per barrel. The $10 estimate is an upper limit to the true effect of speculation, as it is not clear at all that it is indeed speculation which drives oil prices (and not oil prices driving speculation).

Second, in the longer run, speculators do not affect the price of oil. This is not only visible from the chart, but also follows from the fact that speculators neither consume nor produce oil and thus do not influence physical demand nor physical supply of oil, which, ultimately, determine oil prices.

Third, the current period of high oil prices does not seem to be caused by speculators, as net positions of speculators are not overextended. A pick-up in speculative activity could potentially add another $5-10 per barrel. High oil prices in the past month rather seem to be due to another upward shift of the oil price, probably related to the depreciation of the US dollar.

Source: www.economicreason.com

[dukey]

Link

[DantesPeak]

This report is apparently based on the trade report for August. It is correct that oil prices up to August ($58.57) were only 1% higher than last year. So if you think that oil prices will stay average about $58 from September to December, this report would make sense.

But if prices average say around $94, 40% higher, then the I think it will have an effect - a substantial effect on economy.

I guess some economists instead on looking only at the past and want to ignore the present and future.

[pup55]

I do not feel too comforted by this.

What he is not telling you is that for the period July 1-October 30, prices are up 15% year over year.

67.53 vs. 77.86

So we can play spreadsheet games all you want. Let's go back to 2003 and see how much we spent: 30.25 vs. 77.86=257 percent for that period. That's an average of about 65% per year.

[Graeme]

CalPERS investment chief is big on new energy technologies

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')s chief investment officer for the nation's largest public pension fund, Russell Read looks at the big picture. Not so much the big picture today, but the one in 10 or 20 years.

In that crystal ball, he sees the vital importance of energy and commodities all over the world. Much of the existing economy is based on cheap oil. The not-too-distant future will require alternatives, and the California Public Employees' Retirement System is big enough to give alternatives a boost. Future energy demand will create entirely new industries -- and fabulous financial returns. Read is piloting the system to invest in those technologies and companies.

The most difficult challenge -- and the biggest opportunity -- lies in the distribution and production of energy and basic commodities, Read said. In the past four years, prices on concrete, wood and steel -- commodities that usually don't shoot up in price -- have skyrocketed. It is unlikely prices will drop. The increase is driven by demand in Asia; America, long the world's massive consumer, isn't driving this change.

"One of the surprises that people have in the U.S. is that we are used to being the swing factor for commodities supply and demand," Read said. "The predominant demand will come from Asia. China and India are much more the swing factor than the U.S. is."

"This is where it gets interesting. Do we believe there will be an essential demand for 100 million new vehicles in India and China 10 years from now? We would say 'yes.' Could that be powered from conventional petroleum sources? Probably not," he said. "We know there will be demand and there will not be enough energy using current energy sources or current technology."

There are a host of new technologies and fuel sources that will play a critical role meeting world energy demand, Read said, and many of them are clean sources. Market forces will create compelling long-term investment opportunities for CalPERS over the coming decade, and the system will play a constructive and profitable role, Read said.

Everybody wants to save the world, but CalPERS is in a unique position: With assets of more than $250 billion, it is big enough to do something about it.

[SD_Scott]

The hard core among us have probably seen this site but I stumbled upon it. I was noticing that some country's stocks were trending down. Like Belgium for example. I haven't looked at many others, but some were well above year on year.


Stocks by country


Belgium total oil stocks


Belgium total products stocks

[dukey]

that's a gold mine of info
but will take alot of time to go through that
might be worth just looking at the top consuming countries to see what their stocks are

[dukey]

hm

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'U')nited States of America 20,030,000

China 6,391,000

Japan 5,578,000

Russia 2,800,000

Germany 2,677,000

India 2,320,000

Canada 2,300,000

South Korea 2,168,000

Brazil 2,100,000

France 2,060,000

Italy 1,874,000

Saudi Arabia 1,775,000

Mexico 1,752,000

Great Britain 1,722,000

Spain 1,544,000

Iran 1,425,000

Indonesia 1,155,000

[KevO]

at link the left column will steer you also to US/Iran, China, well anything whatsoever actually

[solarpoweredlasers]

I've been doing ok this year on the asx focussing on oil and alternative energy stocks (about 50% return). I thought this would be a good place to discuss any PO related investments people are making atm share market or otherwise.

Geothermal:
GDY has given me 19% this year

Wave/Desalination
CNM is around 130% this year

Solar
DYE made me around 35% before I sold and bought back in at 1.38 for a current 5% loss but overall gain.

Oil
CVN is doing really well at about 75% in the last 4 months.
BPT which i bought on the first major sub prime related dip i've got 34% on


My next purchases besides accumulating more of the above will probably be EMR (oil) at 11c although i'll have to hold for at least 6 months to see any decent return, maybe URO which is indian geothermal at 18c, PCL which is more long term oil at 4c and ARQ who have incredible acreage in the Canning Basin at 1.40.
Will finally get around to picking up some gold stocks too.

What is everyone else doing - any leads?

[solarpoweredlasers]

oo CVN went up 20% today before closing 15% up

[solarpoweredlasers]

CNM has doubled since i mentioned it on the 12th

[dust_farmer]

you trading or investing?

I'm sitting on my hands until the correction comes.

[solarpoweredlasers]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dust_farmer', 'y')ou trading or investing?

I'm sitting on my hands until the correction comes.

[dust_farmer]

I've never seen the attraction of gold but if it works for you go for it. I'll never get in to trading as I'm to risk adverse, besides I like real assets - Agricultural Land.
If you can grab hold of mondays australian (31/12/2007) and look at page 26 in the pure speculation colomn by robin bromby. It just about covers all the main points of whats happening except PO. The second paragraph just about says it all "considering all the carnage now being unleashed, the forecasts remain suprisingly calm" Now if newspaper reporters can see there are problems around then the problems must be due.
I actually do want a major correction as I want to buy in to energy as in the long term it will be such a money spinner.

[solarpoweredlasers]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('dust_farmer', 'I')'ve never seen the attraction of gold but if it works for you go for it. I'll never get in to trading as I'm to risk adverse, besides I like real assets - Agricultural Land.
If you can grab hold of mondays australian (31/12/2007) and look at page 26 in the pure speculation colomn by robin bromby. It just about covers all the main points of whats happening except PO. The second paragraph just about says it all "considering all the carnage now being unleashed, the forecasts remain suprisingly calm" Now if newspaper reporters can see there are problems around then the problems must be due.
I actually do want a major correction as I want to buy in to energy as in the long term it will be such a money spinner.