An independent trader 'seeking his moment of fame' caused oil prices to hit unprecendented levels of $100-a-barrel yesterday following a single deal.
The buyer, who was trading on his own money bought 1,000 barrels of crude oil from a colleague, which is the minimum allowed.
Strangely, he then sold then back almost immediately, making a loss of $600. The move left industry insiders questioning the reasons behind the deal.
Stephen Schork, a former trader at Nymex and editor of the oil market Schork Report told the Financial Times: "A local trader just spent about $600 in a trading loss to buy the right to tell his grandchildren he was the one who did it.
So, in other words, this guy decided he wanted to be an asshole and push the cost of a barrel of oil over $100 and now it's going to cost you and me more money at the pump.
I don't know about you, but I've simply had it with the seemingly dumb things that end up costing me money. Which is why I can't wait for Chevy to put out the Volt.
Sooner or later, oil companies are going to find themselves with a product that not a lot of people want.
Some people seem to think that Republicans like myself don't mind if oil prices go up. I do. I care that more of my hard earned dollars are going towards $400 million dollar retirement packages for CEO's of oil companies.
I care that my money eventually flows into countries that teach hatred of Western nations.
The problem is that I have no alternative. I live 25 miles from my office, so I can't bike to work. I can't ride the bus as that would make my commute 3 hours one way.
If a car company produces a car that uses no gasoline and instead uses electricity and is reliable, I'm all over it. I think the American public think the same way, but it's a matter of getting one to market.
Current oil prices are helping to fuel it's own demise. If gas was $1.80 like it was before the Iraq war, no one would think twice about alternative fuels. The only people that would care would be fringe environmentalists.
But with gas being $3.10 in my neighborhood, alternative fuels like electricity are becoming more and more economically viable.
Just wait until supercapacitors come into their own, then you'll see a real panic amongst OPEC nations.
Supercapacitors, also known as ultracapacitors or electrochemical double layer capacitors (EDLC), are electrochemical capacitors that have an unusually high energy density when compared to common capacitors, typically on the order of thousands of times greater than a high-capacity electrolytic capacitor. For instance, a typical D-cell sized electrolytic capacitor will have a storage capacity measured in microfarads, while the same size supercapacitor would store several farads, an improvement of about 10,000 times. Larger commercial supercapacitors have capacities as high as 3,000 farads.
If the LEES or EEStor devices can be commercialized, they will make an excellent replacement for batteries in all-electric cars and plug-in hybrids, as they combine quick charging, temperature stability and excellent safety properties.
Think about this: If an electric vehicle can be charged up from empty to full in a matter of minutes rather than hours, OPEC will shit themselves because then they have considerably less demand, and people can comfortably say they are helping the environment.
Travis
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