SI
SI
discoversearch

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor.  We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community.  If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.
Strategies & Market Trends : The Epic American Credit and Bond Bubble Laboratory

 Public ReplyPrvt ReplyMark as Last ReadFilePrevious 10Next 10PreviousNext  
To: bart13 who wrote (68542)8/20/2006 8:21:38 AM
From: Wyätt Gwyön  Read Replies (1) of 110194
 
give 5 guys the same chart and 5 different interpretations can come off it.

my wording was "suggests to me". i mean that as nothing more than a guess that could be very wrong. the world is different than it was in the 90s and early 2000s, so who knows.

the things those charts do show is that absolute demand did not drop through the floor. demand growth disappeared, and there was a slight drop in absolute demand. but demand did not disappear.

Do keep in mind that in '91, WTIC went from $18 to $40 and back to $20 or so. In '93, it dropped from about $20 to about $14. From late 2000 to early '02, it went from $34 to under $20.

in the early 90s Saudi Arabia could singlehandedly raise or lower the price of crude. the reason they could do that is that they had a lot of spare capacity they could bring on by opening a few valves. that is not the case anymore. and of course, nobody else has any spare capacity either. if there were spare capacity, prices wouldn't have risen like they have the past few years. this is also why somebody like Grantham can say there's been a paradigm shift, and it's the first he's ever seen in any asset class. Grantham is a longtime student of bubbles, calling the 90s US stock bubble, the housing bubble, etc. but he doesn't call crude a bubble.

anyway, because there is no longer a supply response to higher prices (OPEC is no longer relevant), i believe it's important to look at what demand might do. significantly lower demand can indeed lower prices greatly. i doubt flat demand like we had in 2002ish is going to cause prices to drop to $40, but we shall see.
Report TOU ViolationShare This Post
 Public ReplyPrvt ReplyMark as Last ReadFilePrevious 10Next 10PreviousNext