THE REPRICING OF OIL

"Supply from a new set of [unconventional] resources and the continuance of less-elastic demand from the developing world have created moderate price stability ... Oil prices can’t fall that much because of the cost of marginal supply and overall flat global production, and ... oil prices can’t rise that much because of restrained Western economies ... Short of war, an oil spike of the kind seen in 2007-2008 will not occur ... The oil market now understands that should prices fall below $90, it starts to make sense for large integrated oil companies to simply buy oil on the open market for refining rather than spending the capital to develop the oil from the ground. The cruel math of the marginal barrel now means that prices must stay above the $90 mark to encourage investment in new supply ... When new supply comes online at very slow rate against existing declines, one of the sources upon which the market can draw is inventory ... The point is that inventories are not building ... This is yet another reason why stagnating economic growth in the West has not exerted much downward pressure on global oil prices." 
 
Ein Artikel von Gregor MacDonald über die entscheidenden Parameter, welche die Grenzkosten des aktuellen Ölpreisfensters definieren. Erschienen auf Gregor.us (10. September 2012).