July 23 (Bloomberg) — The $100-a-barrel oil that Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said would prevail by 2009 may be only a few months away.
Jeffrey Currie, a London-based commodity analyst at the world’s biggest securities firm, says $95 crude is likely this year unless OPEC unexpectedly increases production, and declining inventories are raising the chances for $100 oil. Jeff Rubin at CIBC World Markets predicts $100 a barrel as soon as next year.
“We’re only a headline of significance away from $100 oil,” said John Kilduff, an analyst in the New York office of futures broker Man Financial Inc. “The unrelenting pressure of increased demand has left the market a coiled spring.” New disruptions of Nigerian or Iraqi supplies, or any military strike against Iran, might trigger the rise, Kilduff said in a July 20 interview.
That is the paradoxical truth that has paralyzed Western governments since the oil-price explosion of 1999. The rise of petroleum prices from less than $10 a barrel to more than $30 threatens to trigger a wave of inflation that would inevitably be followed by sharp increases in interest rates, which would in turn cause a recession. That would end the miraculously long U.S. boom in the worst possible way.
There appears to be only one solution to this catastrophe: a nasty, pernicious and painful gas tax that will drive gasoline prices to heretofore unseen levels. Take the tax revenue squeezed from every red-blooded American’s fuel consumption and roll it into alternative energy research and technology. Fast-track the whole damn project. Forget pathetic attempts at lowering emissions by 20 or 25% by 2020. The game will be over. Do it now. It will hurt, but in the long run we will all breathe easier.
- Trucking would be hit;
- Railroads would be hit;
- Aircraft would be hit;
- General transportation would be hit;
- Commuters would be hit;
- Plastics industries would be hit;
- Electric power generation would be hit;
- Every aspect of American life would be hit;
- Prices on everything would climb.
Great post. The left will not care about America and the issues she faces until they are back in the Whitehouse. Only then we can expect sembelance of some rational thinking.
Regarding your question about those traveling to Iran with dual citizenships: My feeling on that is they are doing at more than 5 times within a period of 10 years, then they are part and parcel of the regime and should relinquish their American citizenship..too harsh??LOL
The left wants America to collapse so that they can build their world wide workers paradise. They won’t suffer but everyone else will.
Serendip: not in MY opinion!
Shop: except, in my opinion, they will get PRECISELY what they’re apparently wanting AND, they WILL suffer — not CONSIDERING the TRUE consequences of their wishes.
The only people not hurt will be those essentially with no stake in the country; those living on the skirts of their Mommies and Daddies, governmental and otherwise.
BZ
At $100/bbl crude expect to see the following:
1) $100 billion invested by various oil companies into Canadian oil/tar sands
2) $50 billion invested by same in western States, like Montana, that have oil shales, possibly utilizing Israeli extraction technology.
3) Congress getting hammered to single digits until it opens up the Continental Shelf and Alaska to increased drilling.
4) People wondering why they have to move to Canada to brave the weather there to get good jobs… well… western Canada bordering from N. Dakota to Idaho at least.
5) More jetting around by ‘environmental activists’ telling other people to ‘cut back consumption’.
Oh, Iran looks to implode in the next couple of years (timeline starting today and going out to 3 years). The people there are fed up, their oil refineries are dying, their cash cow has been poisoned to death and they realize that their regime sees the majority of the population as the enemy.
Japan and India are *already* lining up oil contracts and exploration contracts for Iraq and have been doing so since late last year. They obviously see something there that the naysayers do not – the change of Iraq by one position upwards in the oil reserve are to come in right after Saudi Arabia and Russia. There is a ‘reason’ Japan is looking to allow its military to operate outside Japan. Also note their first Aegis destroyer, capable ASW vessels, long range rocketry after launching their own satellite to orbit… combine that and Japan might actually put value in children again and stop its population decline.
Finally, al Qaeda in China – OBL always saw fertile ground there and the ethnic mix is right for it. China is clueless on what to do as its ‘million man army’ isn’t set up for COIN work or high desert terrain. And if they take the Mao path of ‘kill them all’ then that will be that for China as agriculture, no matter how poor, is the only sutainable part of their economy. The industrial section is in huge bubble terroritory, when it pops, it will make the US S&L scandal, Japanese meltdown and Asian Tiger meltdown seem miniscule in comparison.
Mind you the Incumbistan Party won’t be able to deal with this. They can’t deal with the fact that ‘Realism’ failed and the primary causes of this CF go by the names: Kissinger, Brzezinski, Vance, Baker, Scowcroft, Christopher. They failed most spectacularly in the Middle East and anyone looking to their followers or to them via the ISG is just plain nuts.
It is time to put aside that ‘Realism’.
And pick up that idealism that makes America a Revolutionary Nation. Otherwise those embers will be found not to be dead and the rallying cry of ‘No taxation without Representation’ will be heard again. Notice how the Incumbistanian Party loves taxes…
Three more refineries would lower fuel cost significantly independent of crude costs.
Crude would have to make $137 to make ethanol help the price of fuel instead of hurting it. Yet ethanol inclusion is mandated most places.
In some states the taxes on fuel are in excess of 20% depending on the price.
See how much our governments care about the costs of fuel. It is all about priorities.
PS every time that idiot in Iran bad mouths the house of Saud, OPEC holds back production to drive the price of his fuel up. That happens regardless of the market. So we pay for islamic temper tantrums at the pump. Nice.
I keep waiting for those gas prices to go that high and very soon.
I’m with you on this post; I absolutely believe it…
There’s too many variables to this to go off on one thing in particular, but everything I’ve read here is part of the problem IMO.
Troops: I fear the first shoe has dropped; we’re about to encounter the second shoe any day now.
BZ