Organization of Petroleum-Exporting Countries

There was some hope in early Japanese trading that after a seemingly endless rout in the USDJPY, which has seen the Yen surge the most in the past two weeks since the 1998 Asian crisis, the BOJ would intervene, if not via policy where it has botched things up beyond repair then directly by selling Yen on the tape: the reason for this is not only yesterday's direct intervention that sent the USDJPY soaring by over 150 pips briefly, but also after a report that Finance Ministry’s FX chief Masatsugu Asakawa met deputy chief cabinet secretary to discuss market issues; this was followed by a mee

He hope we are not the only ones who find it oddly confusing that moments after the WSJ reported that the UAE, supposedly speaking on behalf of the Saudis, said OPEC is "ready to cooperate on a production cut", the very same WSJ writes that the "story may be bogus."

From the WSJ:

Submitted by Arthur Berman via OilPrice.com,

An OPEC production cut is unlikely until U.S. production declines by about another million barrels per day (mmbpd). OPEC won’t cut because it would accomplish nothing beyond a short-term increase in price. Carefully placed comments by OPEC and Russian oil ministers about the possibility of production cuts achieve almost the same price increase as an actual cut.

Bad News About The Oil Over-Supply from IEA and EIA

• CNN reports the US running out of space to store oil.
• At the same time, OPEC actually ramps up oil production...

 Many "smart guys" allege that the drop in oil is bad for the ecomomy. I call BS. Oil prices are an input costs. Input costs are what strip revenues down to profits and potentially losses. The lower the input cost, the higher profit. What has occured was a decades long credit bubble that fueld a profligate binging on debt.

Submitted by Michael McDonald via OilPrice.com,