oil

One week ago when Morgan Stanley was lamenting the relentless buying by algos (or as he called them "macros" and saying "forgive the macros – they know not what they do") who have taken over the function of setting the price of oil despite "increasingly bearish fundamentals", the bank's analyst Adam Longson asked one question: will the summer of 2016 be a rerun of last summer when oil jumped from $45 to $60 only to tumble into the end of the year.

It has been a busy weekend for mostly negative newsflow.

In the latest clear sign that low oil prices are taking their indirect toll not only the US shale sector, leading to billions in capex cuts and hundreds of thousands of lost oil and gas jobs, on Friday Saudi newspaper al-Watan reported that the multinational construction conglomerate Saudi Binladin Gropu (which was founded in 1931 by Sheikh Mohammed bin Laden Sayyid, father of Osama bin Laden who was removed as a shareholder in the business in 1993 and disowned by the family) has laid off 50,000 staff as pressure on the industry rises amid government spending cuts to survive an era

Submitted by David Yager via OilPrice.com,

Never is a long time. The dictionary definition is, “at no time in the past or future; on no occasion; not ever.” In the volatile oil and gas industry, those who try to look that far into the future and predict anything with certainty are invariably wrong. Here’s hoping.

Submitted by Michael Klare via TomDispatch.com,