xlightwavex (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

who would normally make a call for congress and the senate to regulate this den of theiveswell the president would normally push it before it became a problem humm any of your canidates talking about regulating futures of oil any presidents ? twidling thier thumbs looking at the ceiling humming a lil tune.

emforty2 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

so we kinda know the cause but the most powerful nation on earth could do nothing but sit on its ass !!haha most powerful yeah right !!

seneca67 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

well well well. Isn't this fascinating.

jamaljk85 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

-continued from below:Congress better start looking into fixing some of the loopholes in the futures market, or else prices of essential commodities will keep going up - or we can pray that the bubble will burst soon. One more thing: the demand created by the speculative futures market is so big, that carpooling and buying hybrids will not have as big an effect on demand as one might think - some, but not a whole lot.

jamaljk85 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

-continued from below:This news item is a very important story and their reasons, from what I have studied about it, are spot on - but no ones talking about it. Speculative futures markets have always existed and are beneficial to the system, but when big investment companies pour money into the futures market, then they create a disruption, and subvert the Law of supply and demand. And when that happens we end up paying $4.00 a gallon for gas - and gas prices affect everything else.

jamaljk85 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

-continued from below:A lot of money (in the 100s of billions) from hedge funds, pension funds, and other investments have been pouring into the futures market (commodity futures) and this money has been creating an artificial demand which in turn is driving prices up. Oil suppliers and oil companies don't set prices, but the markets do. But oil companies and suppliers (OPEC etc) love this since they get to sell oil and gas, respectively, at prices that are based on current market prices.

jamaljk85 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

-continued from comment below:Since Supply has been keeping up, and Demand hasn't sky-rocketed as prices have, then how come the Law of Supply and Demand is not holding up? Well, that because Demand isn't just made up of only "Real consumer demand" but also demand created in the futures market (non-real demand) as this news story reveals. I looked at some figures, and in the last 6 years or so, Futures demands have been exponential.

jamaljk85 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

I am surprised no one commented on the news story itself. Just last week 5/20/08 the same point was brought up in a senate hearing about unregulated futures market. The market itself is governed by the law of supply and demand (no conspiracy at all). But even with China and India, Demand hasn't been linearly propotional as the prices may suggest - to be more exact - the Real consumer demand hasn't been proportional. On the other hand, supply has been keeping up relatively well with demand.

Nin1963 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

and, there is such a surpus out of Iran that they have filled everything that can be filled and nowhere to send the rest.It's all a shell gameEnron anyone?Phil Gramm paved the way to deregulate energy trading, in a little known ammendment and snuck the thing in out of committee. His wife was on the board of Enron. 5 oil co's control it all with a monopoly bigger than anything ever seen. And, they have cut refining to make it appear that we need to drill more.

keegan6868 (December 31, 1969 at 6:59 pm)

Search on the internet Peak Oil and you'll thats a scare tactic by Big OIl. Apr 2008 issue Popular Science report there are !&% TRILLION barrels of oil in Canadian tar sands thats more oil than all the middle east combined, and they can ezxtract a barrel of oil from tar samds at about $29.00 a barrel. There are 5 Trillion barrels of oil in oil shale here in the US that they can extract a bl of oil for about $40 a bl. I could go on & on---Peak oil not for several centuries yet!