[tatown]

You know it’s speculation, in large part, that is driving the market when insignificant news blurbs (Nigerian pipeline attacked, OPEC calling for oil to go to $170/bbl, GS calling for oil to $200/bbl, hurricane season will be active, etc) cause the price to jump by as much as $10/bbl almost immediately.

The supply/demand (as measured by global excess production capacity) situation has not gotten worse than when oil was at $50-$70/bbl. Lots of new supply coming on line in the next 18 months with demand continuing to wane, yet the price of oil seems to go up every week. Call it either speculation or manipulation, but fundamentals alone don’t explain it.

[tcostell]

Nonsense. The future expectation of the supply of oil explains it perfectly. So long as the western world is more worried about atmospheric CO2 than they are about cheap energy the price will continue to rise.

Speculation has nothing to do with it.