Word: markets
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...What if we took out all the traders who had nothing to do with the oil market? That would leave oil suppliers and oil hedgers: those trying to sell oil and those trying to buy oil, respectively. Suppliers benefit from higher prices and so would not be willing to sell. Hedgers, afraid of soaring prices, would buy oil futures, driving the price to unheard-of levels. Worse still, we would have to worry about the oil suppliers themselves getting in on the futures-price action. They can afford to take on huge risks in the oil-futures market because they...
...same banks that we bailed out are major players in the energy markets: Citigroup, through its Phibro commodities-trading subsidiary, and Goldman Sachs, through its energy-trading desk. Banks are most likely playing a key role in the current run by putting the bailout money to good use: to continue the bid for oil. Again, just a fraction of the bailout is enough to corner the market and rig the price of crude - not that any of these players would dare...
...There is no doubt that the banks and other speculators need accountability and transparency. But smaller speculators - like hedge funds and other trading firms - play a role in maintaining liquidity and reducing the impact that oil suppliers have in participating in the market. Those speculators might benefit from volatility, but without them there would be even more volatility, resulting from radically rising prices. (Read "Black Gold on the Last Frontier...
...While speculators affect the market in both directions, commercial participants tend to put upward pressure on prices. If airlines fully hedged themselves in the futures market, the price of oil would jump enormously. The futures market cannot support hedging for energy, let alone for other things; for example, investors might buy oil to hedge against losses in other investments, like stocks. With speculators out of the market, an airline's hedge would have an even bigger impact, further raising the global price...
...Since an oil supplier has more freedom than an oil hedger - after all, a supplier sits on oil with no rush to sell it, as a hedger attempts to curb real risk - a supplier can squeeze prices higher by refusing to sell on the futures market. The supplier would sell oil just through private deals, whose prices are determined by the futures market - and not the other way around. This catch-22 represents the systemic flaw in the global oil market...