MonteQuest wrote:o2ny wrote: My main point here is that no actual buying and selling needed to take place for these tactics to have an effect... news can influence the market just as much as directly moving huge amounts of money around.
Oh,
someone had to sell in order for oil futures to go down. The market moves by trades buy/sell. If your point is that the govt /repubs themselves didn't have to sell anything, true.
But yes, the price went down due to many factors in the news or not in the news:
1. The end of Katrina effects (almost)
2. The end of the Israeli/Lebanon conflict
3. A mild 2006 hurricane season
4. The end of the summer driving season
5. Simmering of the Iranian nuclear debacle
6. Profit taking
And if there is a govt spin factor, it is the big Gulf oil find re-trotted out from 2004.
Good news, even if it's old, affects the markets.
However, any serious oil future's trader who did his homework saw that news debunked rather quickly.
The speculation factor has diminished.
News, or lack of it, is hardly market manipulation.
Occam's Razor strikes again!
There are a lot of sophisticated models for the oil market out there, but basically its too large and complex to model it with any fixed degree of accuracy for any useful length of time. Plus the Bush administration is criminally incompetent. I just don't see them with the subtly and intelligence to rig that game, even if it wasn't so hellishly complex.
They have lots of money, and some oil to sell but they cant use it without those inputs radically affecting their attempts at price manipulation. The Heisenberg uncertainty principle writ large.
Also the US economy may be(is already) cycling into a recession. That alone would drop the price.
Finally we all know the alarming decline in some of the largest oil fields, and the definite absence of similar sized field to replace them. In the long run that should guarantee ever higher oil prices. (Note this doesnt contradict my earlier statements, knowing the price will be higher in 10 years isnt really useful for trading purposes)
So I'm going to agree with Montequest. Even though I would love to indulge in a conspiracy that involves electing Bush's successor.