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There have been many occasions in the past where oil has gone up and within a week at most, gasoline has gone up too. If there was a large stockpile of refined products on hand, buyers would not be bidding up the cost of oil... choosing rather to wait until lack of demand caused the price of crude to drop before placing purchase orders.
The gasoline market is being GAMED! Bandar Bush could NOT follow through on his promises to lower the price of oil to the Saudi target of around $30 to $35 per barrel... so the oil companies, who KNOW they have a friend in the President, are simply eating this one (and it's not such a big deal, they are making record profits right now, so even if they ARE buying crude futures at astronomic prices, what's in the pipeline now is still the cheaper oil. They are simply missing an opportunity to gouge the customer!) After the election is over, crude will still be over $44/bl, and they will hike the dickens out of gas (now claiming a short supply of refined product)... not to mention heating oil for the winter.
The most worrisome aspect of this is that Bandar Bush COULD NOT increase Saudi production to meet the increased worldwide demand AND hit their stated target price (overproduce to drive DOWN the price of crude). Why? (BTW, Saudi Arabia is the ONLY oil producing country with a significant untapped oil pumping capacity - discounting Iraq)
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