It's all over folks. The consumer has seen it's best days, those days are behind us now. Oil is going to boil over within 30 days and inflation is waiting in the wings to rob each and everyone one of us of our life savings. The oil producers are having major problems with old out dated computer systems in getting product to the consumer. It's not the end of the world, but most people are going to lose their hard earned money. Interest rates will skyrocket in this enviroment, so go do your homework and protect yourself with inflation hedges.

-- JC (jc@att.net), January 15, 2000

Answers

Whare is the proof that oil is in such bad shape? The oil companies have always had some problems. What proof do you have that oil is going to be in such bad shape that oil products are going to sky rocket? How do you Know that the problems that are being experienced aren't temporary and can be worked out ? How do you know that the oil price increase isn't because of OPEC agreements? From 28.00 to 80.00 is a big increase What makes you think oil isn't close to a top now?

-- Gambler (scotanna@arosnet.com), January 15, 2000.

"...and inflation is waiting in the wings to rob each and everyone one of us of our life savings."

Not me, heh heh heh.

-- Total Doomer (sky@falling.com), January 15, 2000.

I buy and sell oil contracts for major producers. NOBODY" is saying anything. Everyone wants to buy before the price goes up. It's no loss to me if you don't believe me, but oil does not jump up because of the media reporting an OPEC agreement. That was already factored in before. Do your homework.

-- JC (jc@att.net), January 15, 2000.

I'm off to fill my gas tank!!!

-- Mega Doomer (Imnot@pol.lie), January 15, 2000.

JC - I thought the same thing last April. Just had six $30 oil calls expire yesterday worthless. Got a couple more $30 oil calls for July 2000. That gives me hope but I have a question. Should oil suddenly skyrocket what would prevent the fed from freezing trade and in that act would they not kill the price, leave me with no way to sell or excersise the calls?

-- Scooter (brucej@infoave.net), January 15, 2000.

Because we live in and around the Oil Patch, we have mainly oil company & related stocks which have done the roller-coaster deal for years. We have hung onto them as we knew nothing about the tech stocks, finding not too much value for their prices, and we knew that intrinsically the oil companies were good value while the oil prices were down.

Now we are seeing increases in the prices of shares from 20-30% in the last month as money filters down from the large oil corps. and the smaller ones that we invest in are starting to move well. One share has ranged from $6-29 (ouch!!!)

I don't know if you have these down in the US, but we have Energy Trusts which pay a dividend each month based on the price of oil at the time....I will quote a site for you to check, because I can't explain it very well...this is not an endorsement, just an example of what I am trying to explain. We will be wanting to see if there are the same kind of investment vehicles if we move south to provide and income. Any input appreciated.

Don't know if we will see $40 (or $80) p/b but it will hurt everyone even if a person is making good profits from oil shares as this commodity is used in all aspects of our lives. Our kids will pay 22% interest on their houses, and debt charges will be sky high. A good reason to be as debtfree as possible. Off the soapbox now.

http://www.pengrowth.com/ (for example only)

-- Laurane (familyties@rttinc.com), January 15, 2000.

JC, to put it bluntly you're either a doomer troll or simply just full of shit.....sorry, no politer way to really say it......

First of all Y2K has virtually nothing to do with today's oil prices.....

Secondly, the vast majority of oil companies don't even expect prices to remain as high as they are today for very long.....as a matter of fact I know one producer that sold 25% of their coming years production at $16.00 per barrel when the price was $12.00 or so as they felt this was a good deal. I can bet you that if they could sell their coming years production at $4.00 higher than todays prices they would commit to selling it all!

The only reason prices have gone to this level, which incidentally is not very high at all once inflation is worked into the equation, is because OPEC producers have for the first time actually stuck by production quotas to some degree whereas their usual cheating on each other has kept the prices artificially low.

So oil may spike into the 30's or even higher for a short time in event of a major war but virtually all the experts think the $20 to $22 per barrel range is the most likely for the long term.

Why do people listen to boneheads spewing out garbage like you when there are hundreds of oil analysts who can actually give them a fairly accurate opinion???????

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), January 15, 2000.

JC, furthermore, 30 days from now you will be doing the typical doomer thing.....either disappearing because your prediction turned out to be so ludicrous, using a different alias so we can't find you or still defending your idiocy by giving a different date for your stupid predicition (You're not a JW are you?).......

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), January 15, 2000.

The price of gasoline dropped 4 cents a gallon in 7 days at 2 cent increments in our town. It's now $1.23 for regular unleaded, this is the cheapest I have seen it in many months. Before Xmas, there were a couple posters here saying that it could rise to $5.00 a gallon before the end of 1999. Of course that didn't happen, it was mere speculation and they were "doing their homework," and predicting at the same time. No one knows what is going to happen in the future except a handful of insiders and they'll protect their behinds before yours, that's just human nature.

-- Rasty (Rasty@bulldoggg.xcom), January 15, 2000.

JC, ignore the venomous attacks. I don't believe we'll see those wonderfully low gasoline prices of early-mid '99 anymore.

Last August I remember asking when to purchase gasoline, and a certain well-known and influential poster told me to wait until after Labor Day because prices would fall. Being a numbskull, I didn't believe him and so bought the fuel in August. Sure enough, the prices rose around the country causing people to gripe. I'm glad I didn't listen to that *expert*.

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 15, 2000.

Dinosaur, JC is being an idiot and I am calling him on it!

Let him put his money where his mouth is.....I suggest that someone impartial finds a good lawyer we can use. We both send lawyer $5000 dollars......If in 30 days from today the oil price is closer to $80.00 per barrel than todays $27.00 per barrel he gets all the money.....otherwise I get all the money!

HOw about it JC.....use your real identity and put your money where your mouth is?

How about you dinosaur? If you are busy defending the little bugger why don't you take my bet on?

-- Craig (craig@ccinet.ab.ca), January 15, 2000.

JC,

Are you related to our RC? Your oil predictions are similar.

Or has our RC been reborn into a more influential religious figure (J. Christ) with better prophetic abilities?

-- Downstreamer (downstream@bigfoot.com), January 15, 2000.

Craig commented:

"So oil may spike into the 30's or even higher for a short time in event of a major war but virtually all the experts think the $20 to $22 per barrel range is the most likely for the long term. "

Craig, could you tell the forum what the EXPERTS predicted in January of 99 the price of crude would be one year later.

I love economists and oil analysts, they make their predictions and a year later NOBODY remembers what anybody said.

Craig, go pedal your BS somewhere else, please!!!

Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), January 15, 2000.

$80 a barrell......in 30 days....

More polly claptrap. $80 a gallon in 10 days is a more reasonable figure. I don't get why these pollies even bother posting here.

-- Butt Nugget (catsbutt@umailme.com), January 15, 2000.

Craig, oh loud and foolish one, you said,

"I know one producer that sold 25% of their coming years production at $16.00 per barrel when the price was $12.00 or so as they felt this was a good deal."

Since the price of oil has been over $16 for over 6 months now, would you care to tell us if these "experts" are still in business?

-- (-@-.-), January 15, 2000.

Lordy, lordy - All of the preceding posters missed his point and misclassified JC. Note his last sentence:

"Interest rates will skyrocket in this environment, so go do your homework and protect yourself with inflation hedges."

The key words are: "protect yourself with inflation hedges".

People, people - he's a Gold Bug Troll. A totally new breed of troll. This board is evolving and changing.

-- Guy Daley (guydaley@bwn.net), January 15, 2000.

Hey Craig, I'm with you. Add in $1,000 for me, I can use the money.

How long will these folks with "special powers" go on before they see the trend? Forever, 'cuz they don't deliberate facts, they "feel".

One universal truth: They are always wrong.

1.Gold did not go to $1,000 an ounce.

@. TEOWAKI did not happen.

3. California was not destroyed by the big one.

4. Oil didn't hit $80 before (and won't soon).

5. Clinton didn't enact martial law.

6. Sunspots and meteors didn't decimate the earth.

7. The market didn't plumet to 2,000.

A person could make a killing just betting against perdictions. One needn't even screen the predictions, since predictions are made by nut cases.

BTW, you won't get any takers to your bet, 'cuz none of 'em actually have the dough to gamble.

-- Randers (coyotecanyon@hotmail.com), January 15, 2000.

Guy, you said: "People, people - he's a Gold Bug Troll. A totally new breed of troll."

I have only one question: Did Andy die?

Disclaimer: Any correlation between Guy's statement and my question is in the mind of the correlation beholder.

-- Anita (notgiving@anymore.com), January 15, 2000.

80 dollar oil is out of the question. That's ridiculous.

40 dollar oil? Maybe 35. I can see 30 dollar WTI showing up here real soon. The funds bought in at an average price of around 26-27. assuming they want at least a two dollar gain plus the room to be able to get out when the time comes, that means they see at least 32 somewhere in the future. Yikes.

Independents do dome shit all the time. Some are really sharp businessmen and some are morons who inherited some wells and know how to sign royalty checks.

The same can be said of large oil organizations. I personally advised a large oil co to buyout some struggling indies back when crude was at 12 bucks. Everyone thought it was to risky. The supply overhang was just to large blah, blah blah. Today they couldn't touch those fields. Period.

-- Gordon (g_gecko_69@hotmail.com), January 15, 2000.

Randers, "A person could make a killing just betting against perdictions. One needn't even screen the predictions, since predictions are made by nut cases." That's a pretty scary generalization as you've just called the FED, Wall Street, every investor whose ever purchased a stock, and every entrepreneur a "nut case."

-- Paranoia Will (Destroy_Y@BlackCopters.com), January 15, 2000.

Downstreamer,

This is RC and NO, I'm not JC. I know that may be hard for you to believe, but its true.

TO ALL...

Not only am I not JC but I think he's more than a little high on his price target...but I'm not the pricing expert and never claimed to be such. I've simply figured that we'd see $30 to $40.00 oil out of this.

What I did note of interest is that the GULF gasoline pricing is seen as indicating production problems...Now I don't have the report handy...I'm sure Downstreamer does, but as I recall there were refineries that were not making enough gasoline to meet the previously agreed contracts with their wholesalers...meaning that they had to go onto the open market to buy extra supply...and they did this at a near panic price rates leaving themselves with virtually no profit margin. NOW why would they do this??? HMMMM.... HMMM..???

Why would refineries make deals to produce and sell "x" amount of gas in January to their wholesalers and then not make enough of it and instead have to go out into the open market to buy it? Answer: They developed unforeseen problems.

Keep in mind that refineries normally don't have problems in January unless it is due to severe cold weather. This January has seen virtually MARCH weather over most of the nation. SO weather isn't the problem. The fact that BP Amoco's York refinery was having problems and finally admitted to having problems finally enables me to confirm that this refinery is indeed Y2K-related as are so many others. Not all of the majors are experiencing problems but most are. We'll see if the trend continues to grow in the next 3 weeks or if it will subside. Meanwhile the pollies are in denial...

Believe it or not, but facts are facts, truth is truth and we've got a rising tide of small problems surfacing in the oil business that may well cascade into the cross-default problems discussed by the the Y2K embeddeds experts. OF course the pollies won't admit it and I wouldn't be surprised as this thing developes, especially if it does indeed get severe... I wouldn't be suprised to seem some pollies go out get guns and start hunting out doomers to kill them... some of these pollies are just so pathological...something we didn't see from the doomer camp. Moral: It's the flipped out pollies that are pathological nut cases. Any pollies still reading and posting flack here on this forum... the foregoing assessment applies to you but you're too sick to realize it.

-- RC (racambab@mailcity.com), January 15, 2000.

Dear Craig from Canada,

I am absolutely no expert in anything, especially OIL. However, I perceive the prices will rise due to constriction, and this is beyond my control. The pumps will rise despite complaints from consumers...

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 15, 2000.

It's amazing that Craig was so extremely critical of JC's prediction, saying it had no justification, and then he seemed to do the same thing himself. Who are all of these mysterious experts who are predicting $20-22 oil. What were they predicting when oil was around $11 or $12? And why do people get so upset over someone's prediction. Too much booze on a Saturday afternoon.?

-- Dave (dannco@hotmail.com), January 15, 2000.

Hey Gordon,

What's "dome shit"? I've heard of salt domes for oil storage. Is this some new innovation? Yuck, Yuck...I know what ya mean!

-- Larry (Rampon@Airmail.net), January 15, 2000.

RC, LOL, you go!

-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), January 15, 2000.

JC, I'd say you're right on track. Just read this morning's news - oil stock's red hot from surging oil prices. Nudging $30/bbl. Excellent call. No one's admitting y2K problems, though. Blaming OPEC's determination to hold production.

-- Okie Dan (brendan@theshop.net), January 20, 2000.

Excellent call JC.

-- Okie Dan (brendan@theshop.net), January 20, 2000.