ROCKMAN wrote:I wonder if there's a special chapter of Gamblers Anonymous for folks who play the oil futures market? LOL:
There's money to be made over time, if it's done right. (I prefer diversified oil stocks in top companies or mutual funds to oil futures, but the principle is roughly the same).
One can diversify one's investments. One doesn't have to take huge positions and play all-or-nothing.
Near the peak of the summer 2008 spike, I got lucky (and maybe a tiny bit smart) and sold two thirds of the natural resource mutual fund holdings I'd been patiently buying every month for 15+ years. (Wasn't smart/brave enough to sell all of it, though I was tempted. FIgured if I did, oil would go to $300).
Then in early 2009, I gleefully bought it back -- for about a third the price I sold it.
And have slowly been buying since. I like the prices now better than I did in 2010-2014. And if it all goes to zero down the road on the back of solar/wind/fusion, etc? Well, that's annoying, but those are the risks you take if you invest in a specific market sector.
To me it's the hedge funds (and especially those that invest in them) that are really crazy. Leverage to the hilt, boom and bust, all for huge fees. AND STILL, PEOPLE FLOCK TO INVEST IN THEM -- EVEN WITH THE SAME MANAGERS THAT RECENTLY BLEW UP SUCH FUNDS!!
Of course, people keep electing the same failed, lying politicans, so I suppose people are just generally stupid.
Given the track record of the perma-doomer blogs, I wouldn't bet a fast crash doomer's money on their predictions.