Paulson On Oil Prices

"The dollar has had a very small impact. The dollar has depreciated 24-25%. Oil has gone up. It's gone up in every currency.

Although there may be a number of factors with regard to oil the predominant factor is supply and demand. What's driving the markets is supply and demand.

Demand has continued to grow and inventories are at low levels. There's not much transparency.

It's important to acknowledge that issue. Only if you acknowledge that issue are we going to be able to find a solution.

We need to see more investment in production capacity, more investment in infrastructure
."

The Nattering One muses... The T-sec is not a clueless fool, but he is a paid liar.

We agree that production capacity restraints are a major issue, however...

Since 2001 $0.85 = 1€; 2008 $1.60 = 1€, for an 88% decrease in dollar value.

Over 95% of oil transactions are denominated in dollars, the dollar debauch has had a huge impact on oil prices.

The #2 contributing factor would be market speculators leveraging up prices by bidding on contracts for far more "virtual oil" than actually exists.

Supply and demand is a distant third with regard to current price. Some majors are actually producing less this year, due to refining constraints.

Since 2001, $15 a barrel, today approaching $150. Had a strong dollar policy been in effect and market speculators kept "honest"...

oil would be priced around $60 a barrel and gasoline would be $1.50 to $1.75. Additional refining capacity would probably drop the price to under $50.

Courtesy of Captain Numerica... Here's a great video of Ol Hanky, notice him to the right of Nancy Pelosi...

kinda lookin a bit tweaked, perhaps someone packed an eight ball during an all nighter with Dubya? Dope!

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