Just because it influences prices doesn't mean that it's able to exert any additional influence when it needs more money. Presumably, it attempts to exert the maximum possible influence at all times.
Just because it influences prices doesn't mean that it's able to exert any additional influence when it needs more money. Presumably, it attempts to exert the maximum possible influence at all times.
Hope is the denial of reality
It puts the lotion on its skinOriginally Posted by Loki
Really not sure what you're trying to prove here?
Supply and demand works here - all OPEC does is try and manage supply.
What they do with their income then has nothing to do with the question of whether supply and demand is in effect (which it is).
I wasn't actually trying to "prove" anything. Other than gas being $3.50/gallon during the winter when travel demand is low, supply is adequate, and people at the pump are scratching their heads.
Source to supply being adequate?
Source to demand is low?
Travel demand is lower in the winter months, especially after holidays like Christmas or New Year. People and packages aren't driving at the same rate or pace. That's a "known" that shouldn't require a source.
Supply is adequate, assuming "known" global oil reserves. Depending on the nations pumping, refining, importing, exporting, utilizing or trading...there's enough wiggle room to undermine supply/demand "technicals". One source couldn't begin to explain the complexities.
Seasonally you might be right, GGT, but demand is almost certainly higher now than it has been in a while because of cyclical factors. There's also a lot more that goes into pricing than US domestic demand - emerging markets in particular have shown strong demand growth, offsetting weak demand in the developed world from both cyclical and seasonal issues.
Supply undergoes a lot of fluctuations from time to time. There isn't a lot of surplus supply lying around, and extraction costs have gone up (especially for deep sea drilling and tar sands). Inventories are tight as well, meaning prices are more susceptible to demand shocks. Supply disruptions in Libya and Nigeria and political unrest in Iran haven't helped crude prices, either; rhetoric about the Straits and sanctions on Iran are also a major source of concern.
edit: I forgot to mention the impact of local issues that I've mentioned before. Refinery closures and relocations have a big impact on local gasoline prices, and local tax environments may be changing in this budgetary environment, depending on the region.
US demand isn't higher now, and emerging market growth is slowing. Supply is also connected to extraction, refining, and transportation to places with demand.
When it comes to oil-producing nations that are involved in political struggles and social unrest...that's what the hypothesis meant regarding "charging enough to pay for their domestic needs". It's a reverse type of pricing that western nations do all the time. Not sure why it'd be such a surprise when OPEC nations do the same.
Demand != US Demand
I'm up to $3.75 hereAnd I'm starting to feel like Honda's MPG claims a little bloated. The accord and the Ion have the same HP rating, 178, and the same MPG ratings 24/32. The difference is that my engine is "tuned" to high octane (91/premium), whatever that truely means when its compared to untuned engines.
I have no problem hitting 240 miles on 10 gallons of gas for city driving in the Ion, but with the Accord, which can eat regular gas (87) I'm hard pushed to reach 200 miles on 10 gallons.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
$3.80 here now. Jumped a dime in one day last week. Wasn't there a move from the CFTC to limit commodity speculators from forcing prices up, and trading on geo-political-social unrest? Whatever happened to that?
$4.05 for the good stuff, and I turned down a chance to work closer to home only hours before reading about how I could be paying $5 by the end of summer.
Last edited by Ominous Gamer; 03-01-2012 at 07:23 PM.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
$5 by May is what I've heard. Here we go again....
How much is a dime?$3.80 here now. Jumped a dime in one day last week. Wasn't there a move from the CFTC to limit commodity speculators from forcing prices up, and trading on geo-political-social unrest? Whatever happened to that?
The smallest variant we ever have is a penny a litre. A one penny change is equivalent to about an 8 cents change. Sometimes it'll move upto about 4-5p per litre (upto 50cents a gallon) a day.
you've got a hanging quote in the wrong thread rand
quite interested in what your reply to that is too
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
Rand, a dime is 10 cents, and would work out to about 2p a liter.
You want to ban people from trading on the basis of a specific type of news? How the hell do you think this would be enforceable and why the hell would you want to enforce it?$3.80 here now. Jumped a dime in one day last week. Wasn't there a move from the CFTC to limit commodity speculators from forcing prices up, and trading on geo-political-social unrest? Whatever happened to that?
Hope is the denial of reality
Wow, I want your gas prices. 1.60€ per liter over here. That's $6.06 per gallon for you guys
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Sorry, not sure I understand what you mean?you've got a hanging quote in the wrong thread rand
quite interested in what your reply to that is too
appears its a sig.damn these cheap screens and dark backgrounds.
Last edited by Ominous Gamer; 03-02-2012 at 12:22 AM.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
There's a difference between industries and corporations that are users and holders of oil and gas (or other commodities) who are hedging for their business survival....and traders/speculators that are simply buying/selling for profits. Airlines, trucking companies, and food growers/distributors are in a different league than HFT and for-profit speculators in general.
If you have a beef with that, take it up with the CFTC. They're the ones who suggested it, not me.
That's because your gas prices include "other costs" and reflect a truer "price" for society. The US doesn't do that, but has decided to make gas cheaper than it really is. Our economy depends on consumption of all things, but especially consuming fossil fuels.Wow, I want your gas prices. 1.60€ per liter over here. That's $6.06 per gallon for you guys
There's a web site that calculated "other costs" into gas prices, including environmental and health impacts, building sprawl, foreign wars for oil and military funding, subsidies for this or that....and came up with the real cost/price of US gas between $10-12/gallon.
Fuel today = 136.4 cents per litre (my nearest servo)
$1 AUD = $0.923 USD
So it is $1.477 USD per litre @ 3.785 litres per US Gallon
= $5.59 USD per gallon
So what do you folks pay for a gallon in the good ole US of A?
Such is Life...
@ Termite: $3.75 USD/ gallon for regular gasoline this morning at the station where I typcially fill. 2 weeks ago it was $3.29 USD/ gallon.
@ Termite / Rand: have gas prices spiked recently in your respective locations? Just wondering if this is a global thing or just in US. Seems like a response to recent economic indicators here ticking up.
Does anyone remember the electricity "crisis" in the Western US back around the early 00s? There were rolling blackouts in California and the price of electricity went through the roof and the California economy got kicked in the nuts. It turned out there was no electricity shortage and a number of electricity traders were manipulating the system to drive up prices. The craziest part about that whole thing, imo, is how quickly it was forgotten and how there was no real national "discussion" about the electricity market system, which iirc was fairly new at the time.
The questions on my mind today, and that ought to be on everyone's minds, with the electricity market manipulations in mind as a real-world proof of concept, include:
1. Is the global oil market open to the same kind of manipulation?
2. Is the US domestic gasoline market open to the same?
3. Is there a motive to manipulate the US gasoline market? Sure. Big high stakes motives. Some I can think of off the top:
a. Environmental - higher gas prices means less driving/ better market for fuel efficient transportation which = less CO2 and other related pollution generated. Also = greater incentive to develop alternative energies and more overall use of energy efficient tech/ methodology in US and world
b. Profit - of course
c. Political - seems as though every time the US economy is poised to recover, the price of gas spikes, esp. in election years. If I want a Republican congress, circa 2010, or in the Whitehouse in 2013, then I probably don't want a healthy economic recovery running up to the relevant November. Very high gas prices spook consumers, with all the resulting economic woes...
d. National security - similar to environmental, different goals. Higher gas = more energy efficiency all around, more incentive to drill at home, more incentive to develop renewables, which = in longer term less dependance on foreign oil, less geo-political vulnerability to volatile often hostile nations
4. If the markets are being manipulated, should the manipulation be stopped, given 3a and 3d and assuming it stays at a reasonable level?
5. If 4 were "no," is market manipulation the right way to do this? Maybe, in the US, it's the only way to do it, given our political system. Could this be an initiative from the private sector itself, involving no coherent government policy? Sounds like the makings of a great novel....
The Rules
Copper- behave toward others to elicit treatment you would like (the manipulative rule)
Gold- treat others how you would like them to treat you (the self regard rule)
Platinum - treat others the way they would like to be treated (the PC rule)
You don't see a difference between electricity prices being unnaturally high in one small part of the US and gas prices going up everywhere after the global price of oil reaches a 5-year high?
Hope is the denial of reality
So a change of 46cents per gallon. Which is 12 cents per litre (sorry I thought it was 5 litres per gallon). Which is 7.5 pence per litre. Yes, 7.5p/litre seems quite a reasonable variance over a few weeks. Not that big a change to be honest, seen much bigger in a week or two before.
Yes its changed globally: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17231140@ Termite / Rand: have gas prices spiked recently in your respective locations? Just wondering if this is a global thing or just in US. Seems like a response to recent economic indicators here ticking up.
That's a new article from today, prices here have reached a record high of an average 137.44p per litre (despite being over a pound for last few years, we still measure petrol in pennies). That's $2.1833 per litre or $8.25 per US gallon.
You'll have to take our commute times, traffic, speed limits, driver competence and attitudes*, and road conditions too.Wow, I want your gas prices. 1.60€ per liter over here. That's $6.06 per gallon for you guys
*Attitudes may include seeing people blow stop signs in school zones, blocking intersections when those intersections are train tracks, not using turn signals, slowing an SUV or Jeep down to 5 mph or swerving violently to avoid inch deep potholes, or seeing your use of turn signals as an indicator that they should be in front of you.
. . .
Not to mention, at least for termite, how everything is a fuck ton more expensive down under compared to our prices, usually far more than the 25% his gas price is suggesting. Gas for him seems pretty damn sweet.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
Of course I do. The relevance is that the electricity market price rigging scheme showed big complex markets like these are riggable and people will rig them. It head's off the very first response to a question about whether a conspiracy is possible, which is "no, it can't happen, the market is too big and/or too complex, too many people with a lot to lose in a rigged market are watching, they could never get away with it, etc etc." It can happen because it did happen.
So from there the next question is why? Well, there's a LOT of reasons to rig the world oil market. A controlled, moderate rise in oil prices is arguably a good thing for human civilization as a whole.
Then on to the next, what is different about the global oil market that makes what happened in the Western US impossible?
And arguably, if you determine it's not impossible, you should probably determine if it should be stopped before you go about identifying what/how it is happening and figuring ways to stop it.
The Rules
Copper- behave toward others to elicit treatment you would like (the manipulative rule)
Gold- treat others how you would like them to treat you (the self regard rule)
Platinum - treat others the way they would like to be treated (the PC rule)
You mean plan ahead? Humanity doesn't work that way.
In the future, the Berlin wall will be a mile high, and made of steel. You too will be made to crawl, to lick children's blood from jackboots. There will be no creativity, only productivity. Instead of love there will be fear and distrust, instead of surrender there will be submission. Contact will be replaced with isolation, and joy with shame. Hope will cease to exist as a concept. The Earth will be covered with steel and concrete. There will be an electronic policeman in every head. Your children will be born in chains, live only to serve, and die in anguish and ignorance.
The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.
Erm, I hate to disappoint you but those guys are over here as well
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Are you hypothesizing that is a biological characteristic and not a cultural one?
The Rules
Copper- behave toward others to elicit treatment you would like (the manipulative rule)
Gold- treat others how you would like them to treat you (the self regard rule)
Platinum - treat others the way they would like to be treated (the PC rule)
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