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I'm probably alone in this, but I can't wait for prices to go back up. As they've tumbled over the past few months, I've saved $3-400 on fuel costs, while losing over $50k in retirement funds. Both are due to the fall in oil prices.
I'm probably alone in this, but I can't wait for prices to go back up. As they've tumbled over the past few months, I've saved $3-400 on fuel costs, while losing over $50k in retirement funds. Both are due to the fall in oil prices.
Me too. Yes I save a little at the pump, maybe 10 or 20 bucks a week while I am losing thousands in investments every month. Funny thing is I have not seen groceries or goods go down in price, they only go up despite the excuse that gas prices are a reason they are so high and continue to grow. I'll take higher gas prices and good returns on my investments over saving a few bucks at the pump each week and groceries and goods still remaining high.
I'm probably alone in this, but I can't wait for prices to go back up. As they've tumbled over the past few months, I've saved $3-400 on fuel costs, while losing over $50k in retirement funds. Both are due to the fall in oil prices.
I wouldn't blame stocks being down on low oil and commodity prices entirely. The weak economy in China is what really has the market scared right now. Plus I think the 10-15% gain over the last 18-24 months was unsustainable, there was a bubble IMO.
Yeah, the low fuel prices has triggered another big round of layoffs in the local oil business. What makes it doubly tough is that these layoffs aren't the grunt laborers, but highly trained, skilled, and paid specialists that command top salaries. The grunts were phased out in the 80's and a lot of the people left occupy the upper-middle class economic strata. You know, the people who buy things like nice homes, cars, college educations for their kids, and all kinds of consumer goods. When these people feel the pinch, the whole economy goes bad - and it can do so rapidly.
Big Oil is suffering badly at sub-$30/bbl crude prices, but don't worry, they're not going broke. They are making part of it back on increasing natural gas prices, and lower feedstock prices for their PetroChem interests. But it may be a sign of something worse happening that will come back to bite us down the road a bit. Big Oil makes huge investments in technology, and the ripple effects include not just drilling and production of crude, but may set back exploration several years. A friend who is a fairly large independent oil operator once said "All the cheap oil's been found." and we're going to have to work for what's left. Well, we learned new technologies in horizontal drilling and mass fracking that nearly doubled our accessible reserves, but we can't produce it for $30/bbl - not if we intend to make enough money to cover its costs of recovery. The saying among wildcatters in the Permian was "There were plenty of fortunes made on $4 oil.", but that was 70 years ago before inflation made us the poorest millionaires on the planet.
Texas' Permian Basin, out in West Texas between Midland and Odessa is one of the oldest, most productive, and best studied oilfields in the world. Flying over it, the area looks like a pincushion, marked by lease roads branching out for as far as you can see from 30,000 feet. Each of these roads has branches that terminate in what looks like a black smudge - these are individual wellheads, and most have been producing at one level or another since the 1930's. There are thousands of them, many still on "natural drive", not requiring a pump . . . yet. This ancient field is so well surveyed, it changed most of the nomenclature of geology. It is the home of WTI, the West Texas Intermediate crude that forms the basis of world oil pricing. Right now, exploration has halted - even here where known reserves exist right under your feet, it's not economic to drill for them.
That's bad because we have proven resources farther south in Texas' Eagle Ford, and north in the Bakken Shale of North Dakota, not to mention the monumental finds in the Deep Gulf, but even the recent booms are going bust as oil prices plunge below $27/bbl. Oil companies are turning back to imports as the President's recent deals with Iran have exacerbated the problem of the Saudis opening their oil taps to feed mounting debt. Iran will add millions of barrels to the flood, forcing oil prices even lower now that the embargo's been lifted. Europe, and even Russia is caught up in this belly-flop in oil prices too, Europe with no oil resources as the North Sea fields run out, recently having reversed a 40-year boom, and Russia with its Siberian fields falling apart due to lack of maintenance and continuing investment, are facing a real crisis not far down the road.
It would seem that any portfolio manager would tell you the solution to crippling market trends is in diversification. Evidently the energy industry is slow to learn. Rather than divert all resources to exploring new hydrocarbon recovery technologies, maybe we ought to be looking a growing and managing our renewable resources. Wind, hydropower, even biofuels can help produce electricity for our power grid, but something more must be done on the downstream side of the business as well. More and better infrastructure to deliver and dispense both electricity and fuels will be necessary. Of course it goes without saying on an automotive forum, we have responsibilities in the auto industry to develop inexpensive, efficient vehicles to better use the resources we have.
Where once we thought about developing fuels for the future, we must now factor in economics as well as science and engineering. We need a balance of natural gas, wind, water, and biofuels as we phase out hydrocarbon-intensive generating plants. We're going to have to replace our reliance on nuclear power at some point . . . it was a good interim solution, but we have to look at the realities of disposal and contamination by waste the nuclear option creates.
We are making a good start. Hybrid and electric cars are becoming more efficient and more accepted as they incorporate new storage and digital technologies that may bring them into parity with fossil-fueled vehicles in a few years. What we still need is a plan. Rather than going off in all directions at once, let's look at not only the technical aspects of developing, distributing, and using energy, but the economics as well. Until we can make all of this profitable, our electric cars will be in the garage - a museum piece of our own hubris.
I wouldn't blame stocks being down on low oil and commodity prices entirely. The weak economy in China is what really has the market scared right now. Plus I think the 10-15% gain over the last 18-24 months was unsustainable, there was a bubble IMO.
Step right up to Canada, low oil means low dollar which create regional imbalances:
British Columbia enjoying a surge in tourism and exports, real estate is booming due to higher purchasing power with US dollar
Alberta, Sask. Western Manitoba is slow, mostly reliant on agriculture, oil and related services from upstream. Investments are down, outlook is grim and consumer spending is down. Low gas prices don't mean much if you are worried about losing your job or groceries are up 50%
Eastern Manitoba, Ontario are ok for now. Manufacturing, exports and tourism driven economy with a concentrated population keeps prices increase in check, but still consumer spending is down.
Quebec, western Maritimes are ok, not up, not too down, prices are up consumer spending is down. Trickle down to come still.
Eastern Maritimes are down, seasonal economy reliant on upstream oil market. Very little downstream and services. Tourism will be the upside come springtime.
Step right up, things aren't as rosy as people think and aren't about to get better unless oil is bak to about $50/barrel
It's ironic that the empty barrel is worth more than the content at this point.
This is far lower than it has been recently. I filled up on Monday night, and then it was still around $2.34 for regular (naturally I used premium, don't recall the price though).
Maybe there is a easy answer for this but why is there mid grade these days? I don't think I have ever seen a car that says use mid grade/mid grade only. It is either regular or premium. Pretty much no one is going to use mid grade in a car rated for regular as it would be mostly pointless, most don't use mid grade in cars rated for premium but some manufactures like Acura do say you can use it and even recommend it in many of their cars that say premium, there just does not seem to be a real need or point for mid grade and few people use it. I did put mid grade in my GS last night just to see if I noticed any difference but did not fill it up, mainly just mixed it with some premium which really would be harmless.
01-21-16, 05:45 AM
