Related: The Low Price of Oil
Still dropping, and although gas prices are the lowest they’ve been in years, the price closed below $60 for first time since July 2009, so Happy New Year!
"Oil resumed its slide Wednesday, taking stocks down with it, following an OPEC report that projected demand for its crude would sink next year to levels not seen in more than a decade. The decline accelerated after the Energy Department said that domestic oil inventories had increased. Analysts expected a decline. Falling oil prices and concerns about global growth have pushed stocks down sharply since last week. Shares of airlines, which are heavy fuel users, benefited from oil’s plunge."
So have the truckers:
"As shippers of everything from toys to tools enjoy as much as $24 billion in savings from lower diesel surcharges next year, trucking companies see an opening to raise freight rates at a pace not seen in about a decade. The American Trucking Associations calculates that each 1-cent drop spurs industrywide annual fuel savings of $350 million. Diesel last week averaged $2.15 a gallon, down from $2.85 in the last 12 months. About 85 percent of the savings goes to shippers through lower fuel surcharges. That may soften shippers’ resistance to higher rates that trucking companies say they need to cover rising expenses for salaries, health care, and new regulations that limit driving hours. Unlike previous times when fuel prices fell, stronger economic growth is increasing demand for cargo space while drivers are scarce, which spurs higher rates. Large truckers boosted freight prices on average between 3 and 4 percent this year, and they may rise 5 to 6 percent in 2015, Jason Seidl, an analyst with Cowen & Co., estimated in an interview. ‘‘In this environment, the economy is decent and fuel is falling, which is the perfect combination for a truckload guy,’’ he said."
You get $crewed at every turn in 21$t-century AmeriKa.
"Cheaper gas, hiring lift October retail sales" by Christopher S. Rugaber | Associated Press November 15, 2014
WASHINGTON — US retail sales rose modestly in October, evidence that recent job gains and lower gas prices are lifting consumer spending as the holiday shopping season begins, the Commerce Department said Friday.
That's bull$hit.
Employers have stepped up hiring, giving more Americans paychecks to spend and boosting consumer confidence. Stock prices have reached new highs, possibly encouraging more spending by wealthy households. Greater spending could spur more growth because consumer spending makes up about 70 percent of economic activity.
The only cla$$ that matters.
Auto sales rose a solid 0.5 percent, after falling sharply in September. Americans also spent more at restaurants and at sporting goods and health care stores.
Economists said the figures suggest consumer spending could rise by 2.5 percent to 3 percent in the fourth quarter. That would be only a moderate gain, but above the July-September quarter’s 1.8 percent increase.
The report shows a ‘‘boost to consumer spending power and sentiment from plummeting gasoline prices that we anticipate will continue into the key holiday shopping period,’’ said Ted Wieseman, an economist at Morgan Stanley.
And just wait until after the season after sales have disappointed. The oil companies are going to get even with the damned AmeriKan consumer after keeping prices low! Then we failed to uphold our end of the bargain by spending money we don't have or going into debt to boost corporate bottom lines!
You are gonna pay, damn Amerikan consumer. Read it here first!
Sales at electronics stores plunged after a big gain the previous month, when the newest iPhone went on sale.
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While many categories showed sales gains, there were some signs consumers remain cautious.
The category that includes major department stores and other general retailers reported flat sales last month.
That echoes the largely disappointing sales reports this week from many retail chains, including Macy’s, J.C. Penney, and Kohl’s.
Walmart, however, said that cheaper gas helped boost sales at its stores in the August-October quarter. But it also warned that deep discounting would likely lower profits over the holiday shopping season.
Outside retail chains, sales were mostly healthy. Online and catalog retail sales jumped 1.9 percent, the biggest gain since March. And sales at restaurants and bars rose 0.9 percent, the most since May. Sporting goods stores said their sales climbed 1.2 percent.
The economy and job market have made steady progress for most of this year. Employers have added an average 229,000 jobs a month through October.
That’s put hiring in 2014 on track to be the strongest in 15 years. The unemployment rate has fallen to 5.8 percent, a six-year low, from 7.2 percent 12 months earlier.
Gas prices have dropped for 49 straight days to an average of $2.92 a gallon nationwide, according to AAA. That is the lowest in nearly four years. According to one rough rule of thumb, every one-cent decline in gas prices frees up about $1 billion for consumers to spend on other items.
Not this year. Already lo$t an arm and thumb this holiday $ea$on.
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Related:
"The average price of gasoline in Massachusetts fell below $3 a gallon for the first time in almost four years, AAA Southern New England said Monday. The average for a gallon of self-serve, unleaded regular was $2.96, down eight cents since last week. Gas prices are declining as global demand weakens because of sluggish economies overseas and rising US oil production."
Yeah, whatever.
"Lower gas prices are another piece of good news for an economy that has broadly improved this year. Then nation has added at least 200,000 jobs in each of the last nine months and the unemployment rate has declined to 5.8 percent, the lowest in more than six years. Consumer confidence last month jumped to its highest level since 2007, which analysts attributed in part to falling gas prices. The good news at the pump has followed the plunge in the price of crude oil, which accounts for most of the cost of gasoline. The combination of weaker global demand and increasing supplies, largely due to the US production boom, have push crude prices to their lowest levels since 2010, when the global economy was still emerging from a deep recession. Crude pries have dropped 28 percent since June, to less than $78 a barrel from $107. Since most of the money spent on petroleum products flows out the United States to foreign producers, savings at the pump means more money stays here to support the domestic economy, said Christopher Knittel, an energy economist at MIT. “That leads to economic growth,” he said. Gasoline accounts for just a small part of household expenses, about 5 percent, according to the Labor Department. Rising costs in other parts of the household budget, including food and electricity, may blunt the impact of falling gas prices."
I'm told "commuters are finding enough change in their pockets to buy a cup of coffee," while the Warren Buffett, Duracell deal will save both sides billions in taxes (from the rich guy who says he should be paying more).
And is it really good news? What is left out of all that is the Saudi overproduction killing the price to halt US expansion while the US encourages the policy to weaken Russia.
Drink up the gasoline prices while they last, Amurkns!!
"Good news on retail sales boosted stocks, although concerns about the latest drop in oil prices kept the gains in check. The continued plunge in oil prices also give consumers more money to spend, analysts said."
The gas prices are good news, good news, then not!
"This week’s OPEC meeting is the most important in years" by Steven Mufson, Washington Post November 26, 2014
WASHINGTON — For most of the past four years, OPEC has had an easy time.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries hasn’t had to do much to keep oil prices above $100 a barrel. Disruptions in supply — most notably the Libyan civil war — and rising demand have kept the cartel’s coffers full.
Yet, high prices are often the seeds of their own destruction, providing incentives for new developments and alternatives. Now, over the past three months, global oil production has been outrunning consumption, and suddenly, the 12-member group is bickering about who should cut oil output, and by how much, in order to prop up prices.
Cui bono?
That has made Thursday’s OPEC meeting in Vienna the group’s most closely watched session in years, with far-reaching implications from the local gasoline pump to the oil-dependent budgets of Russia and Iran.
Saudi Arabia, which has played the role of swing producer balancing the market, has not trimmed its output as it often has in the past, instead cutting prices to hang onto market share while waiting for other countries to volunteer to share the burden. Meanwhile, prices have continued to slide to about $75 a barrel for the US benchmark grade of West Texas Intermediate.
‘‘I think they’re worried about a collapse in prices,’’ said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. ‘‘They are worried about pushing people toward alternative fuels and worried about the cost of maintaining their spare capacity. They are intrigued by [the] possibility that low prices put their enemies in tighter positions. But I think the way the Saudis think about global oil markets is more about threats than opportunities.’’
In an unusual move, Venezuela has arranged a Tuesday meeting in Vienna with Russian officials to persuade Russia, a non-OPEC member that exports about 4 million barrels a day, to cut its production to prop up prices.
Russia has not coordinated output with OPEC in the past, but its stake in the outcome of Thursday’s meeting is high. At a conference in Moscow, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said the country would lose between $90 billion and $100 billion in revenue as a result of lower oil prices, more than twice as much as it stands to lose as a result of sanctions from its support of rebels in Ukraine, a Bloomberg News report said.
If you read through the propaganda pre$$ code you can see that what I say is true!
There have been two main reasons for the recent surplus of crude oil: The economic stagnation in Europe and Japan has sapped demand, and the steady increase in US production of shale oil, up 4 million barrels a day over the past six years, has bolstered supply. That new incremental US production is greater than the entire production of any OPEC country except Saudi Arabia.
Most analysts are expecting some OPEC production cuts, perhaps half a million barrels a day, but most of them also doubt that the cuts will be big enough to increase, or even maintain, current prices.
And if the cartel fails to reach an agreement....
Then what?
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Hey, why worry?
"Oil plunge is threat and boon to global economies" Globe wires November 29, 2014
NEW YORK — OPEC’s decision to not cut production prompted a plunge in both oil prices and the stock prices of major energy companies Friday, sparking concerns that a tumbling market could shake governments dependent on oil revenues while offering a preholiday bonus for consumers and many businesses.
Not a big enough one for the US economy.
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Shares of companies across the energy industry fell. Chevron Corp. slid 5 percent while Exxon Mobil fell 4 percent....
The latest sell-off follows the decision Thursday by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to leave its production target at 30 million barrels a day. Member nations of the cartel are worried they’ll lose market share if they lower production.
Partly because of the shale oil boom in the United States, the world is awash in oil at a time when demand from major economies is weak — so prices are falling. But the pain being felt by energy producers is proving to be a big gain for consumers and businesses that are heavily reliant on energy.
Yeah, the poor energy companies.
Riding high are the airlines, package delivery services, and cruise lines, which are spending less on fuel....
And raising rates, fees, and the rest, from what I've $een.
In Massachusetts, both gasoline and home heating oil prices have declined significantly. Gas prices dropped more than 80 cents a gallon since the summer, to an average $2.87 a gallon earlier this week from $3.70 in June, according to AAA Southern New England.
Then why are prices not really dropping anywhere at all other than the gas pump? WTF?
Since the beginning of October, the price of heating oil has slid 17 cents to an average of $3.33 a gallon, according to the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources. That price is more that 50 cents a gallon lower than a year ago.
OPEC, responsible for about 40 percent of the world’s oil supply, seems at a loss about how to cope with this new source of competition and is also struggling to influence other big producers outside the organization such as Russia and Brazil. Unable to come up with a strategy for handling these new developments, the cartel has decided not to intervene, evidently hoping that low prices will eventually curb production in the United States.
A-ha.
Many of the wealthier Middle East countries such as Saudi Arabia should be able to absorb the lower profits with little effect on its economy. But the weak prices are punishing such nations as Russia, which gets about 50 percent of its state revenue from oil exports.
In the United States, the last time the average price was below $2 was in early 2009, while in the grips of the recession.
‘‘The average driver may be shocked by how much gas prices drop before we see a low,’’ said Michael Green, a spokesman for AAA. ‘‘It’s a remarkable time to be a driver.’’
Except I have no money to go anywhere (except for my one daily luxury, a coffee and a Globe).
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Some are saying it is the beginning of the end for OPEC, but they are not even close:
"Exxon sees abundant oil, gas far into future" by Jonathan Fahey, Associated Press December 10, 2014
NEW YORK — North America, once a sponge that sucked in a significant portion of the world’s oil, will instead be supplying the world with oil and other liquid hydrocarbons by the end of this decade, according to ExxonMobil’s annual long-term energy forecast.
And the ‘‘almost unspeakable’’ amount of natural gas found in recent years in the United States and elsewhere in North America will be enough to make the region one of the world’s biggest exporters of that fuel by 2025, even as domestic demand for it increases, according to Bill Colton, Exxon’s chief strategist.
Related: Write-down of two-thirds of US shale oil explodes fracking myth
Oh. The Globe didn't tell me that.
‘‘The world has such an improved outlook for supplies,’’ Colton said in an interview. ‘‘Peak oil theorists have been run out of town by American ingenuity.’’
That's true, but not for the reasons you think. Turns out oil isn't created by fossilized remains and the carbon from plant deposits; it's constantly being cooked and created within the earth.
In a forecast that might make economists happy but environmentalists fret, Exxon’s two chief products, oil and natural gas, will be abundant and affordable enough to meet the rising demand for energy in the developing world as the global middle class swells to 5 billion and buys energy-hungry conveniences such as cars and air conditioners.
For how long?
This is a result of advances in drilling technology that have made it possible for engineers to reach oil and gas in unconventional rock and extreme locations and quieted talk that the world was quickly running out of oil.
Oh, it's all the fracking that is spoiling our water supplies.
And it is despite what Exxon assumes will be increasingly strict policies around the world on emissions of carbon dioxide and other gasses emitted by fossil fuel use that scientists say are triggering dangerous changes to the world’s climate.
Then why is it so damn cold?
Exxon’s outlook forecasts world energy supply and demand through 2040 and is updated every year. It is noted by investors and policy makers and used by Exxon to shape its long-term strategy. Colton said the recent sharp decline in oil prices does not have much effect on the company’s long-term vision, and that the company expects prices to rise and fall, sometimes dramatically, throughout the period.
Exxon’s vision is broadly similar to that of other forecasters, including those by the International Energy Agency, which released its most recent long-term forecast last month.
The use of coal, now the world’s second most important fuel after oil, will eventually slip as countries try to reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. Natural gas, which burns cleaner than coal and emits half the global warming gases as coal, will supplant coal in the number two spot.
Exxon takes a relatively dim view of the prospects for renewable energy, however.
Really?
It believes that some of the aggressive targets for renewables cited by governments are too expensive to come to fruition, and the technologies have not advanced far enough to make them cheap or effective enough for broad adoption globally.
‘‘They are just not ready for prime time,’’ Colton said.
Yeah, too bad this nation spent and continues to spend trillions upon trillions to wage wars based on lies and bail out looting banksters. Should have used that money to develop clean energy, but oh well. At least well-connected corporations got gobs of tax loot and credits out of the wasted government dough.
Now I just want the pipeline and get outta my face.
While Exxon expects wind, solar, and other nonhydroelectric energy to grow faster by far than any other energy technology over the period, those renewables will provide just 4 percent of the world’s energy by 2040, up from 1 percent in 2010. Fossil fuels will still dominate: Oil will account for 32 percent of world energy, natural gas for 26 percent, and coal for 19 percent. Nuclear and biomass will account for 8 percent each, and hydroelectric power will account for 3 percent.
Then the wars will, in fact, never end.
Michael E. Mann, a climate scientist and director of Penn State’s Earth System Science Center, noted that many experts dispute Exxon’s conclusion on renewables because in several places around the world renewable energy is competitive with the price of traditional power, even without a high price on carbon pollution that Exxon and others seem to agree is coming.
He of hide the decline fame telling us banks will $ave the world?
Scientists say if Exxon’s vision comes to pass the world’s climate system will become dangerous and chaotic, and some environmental economists suggest that economies will be forced to stop burning fossil fuels at such high rates to prevent catastrophic climate change.
Pffffffffftt!
‘‘Exxon’s vision of a fossil fuel-driven future is one in which carbon dioxide levels rise well beyond the dangerous limit, where we will witness fundamental threats to food, water, land, our economy, national security, and our environment,’’ Mann said. ‘‘Let us hope, for the sake of us and our planet, that this is not our future.’’
Other recent scientific studies suggest oil and gas companies and government forecasters could be overestimating how much oil and gas is accessible in the shale formations that have fueled the US boom in oil and gas production.
No!?!
Ken Cohen, Exxon’s government and public affairs chief, said the studies ‘‘are not consonant with the facts.’’ He said Exxon is finding that improving technology is increasing the productivity of each well they drill.
That will mean that by the end of the decade, North America will be exporting more oil and liquid hydrocarbons than it imports, a remarkable turnaround for a region that was a major global importer.
‘‘Limitations are political and policy-related more than technical,’’ Cohen said.
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Those studies were di$mi$$ed pretty quick, huh?
"Heating oil prices fall as natural gas prices start to rise" by Jay Fitzgerald, Globe Correspondent November 27, 2014
This year: Natural gas prices are rising in the region, while home heating-oil prices have plunged to their lowest levels in four years.
The drop in heating oil costs follows the plunge in crude oil prices, the result of a surge in US production and a slowing global economy that’s lowering demand.
Related: Rising Electric Rates Are to Extort Gas Pipeline
Oh. I was tolled....
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Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, a forecasting firm in West Chester, Pa., said, “The plunging gasoline prices are particularly potent — almost like a giant tax cut that puts more money in people’s pockets.”
And that's where the money will stay.
Alan Helfgott, the owner of a three-bedroom home in Boylston, said the recent fall in prices means he’ll save more than $300 this winter on heating oil delivered by Noar’s Oil of Worcester. Prices are 50 cents below last year’s levels.
“We’ll take any relief we can get in the price of oil or gas,” said Helfgott, a regional sales manager for a bank. “It gives me a little bit more disposable income. It may mean going out to the movies and restaurants a little more, or maybe buying a TV. A lot of good things can come with that extra money.”
So $ayeth the.... banker (sigh).
Some economists question how much further prices can fall. The recent plunge in crude oil prices, to about $74 a barrel, is close to the break-even point for many US oil producers, who could start losing money if their expenses exceed the prices they’re getting.
It's dropped far below that and is still in free fall like a WTC tower on 9/11.
David DuFault, a sales manager at Noar’s Oil, said he’s just relieved that heating oil prices have fallen and natural gas’s cost advantage has narrowed, making his product more competitive.
“We’re very, very happy for our customers,” he said. “This is wonderful news. If prices stay down, it’s going to be great for everyone involved.”
Is it, because I've been getting different spins from different barrels.
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At least you can fill your tank, what with the roaring US economy and low oil prices:
"Malden-based social services agency in financial distress" by Sean P. Murphy, Globe Staff December 05, 2014
A Malden-based social services agency that helps provide fuel assistance to about 6,000 families and operates a Head Start program for children is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy while the state scrambles to find a provider to take over its accounts.
Tri-City Community Action Program, known as Tri-Cap, which has served low-income people for more than 30 years in Malden, Medford, Everett, and surrounding communities, may be dissolved because of severe financial difficulties, state officials said Thursday.
The state Department of Housing and Community Development is in intense and detailed discussions with Action of Boston Community Development to run the programs temporarily to avoid disrupting services as cold weather sets in....
In this age of global warming?
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Quite amazing in this era on unparalleled wealth inequality, isn't it?
Blog adjourned!
