Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Credit Where Credit Is Due: Barron's Cover: "Here Comes $75 Oil" March 29, 2014

The cover article was smart and, more importantly, it was right.
And so were we.
WTI $49.27 down 77 cents after trading as low as $48.47.
First posted Saturday, March 29, 2014:

Barron's Cover: "Here Comes $75 Oil"
There is a lot of the stuff sloshing around.

Throw in the geopolitical angles (US/EU v. Russia; Saudia v. Persia) and a bit of downside protection may be in order.

Plus, we've been calling for it since $106-107, seven months ago and frankly I'm getting tired of the répétition, know what I'm sayin'?

Apparently contradicting the 'sloshing around' statement is the forward curve for WTI, currently in pretty steep backwardation from May 2014 at $101.67 to June 2016 at $84.73. That's a simplistic view however and does not account for above ground oil entangled in financing deals (Hi Izzy) and in situ storage. Remember July 4, 2008?

Oil began its historic decline from the previous day's all time high with the curve backwardated.

From Barron's:
Lower energy costs will have a salutary effect on the U.S. economy. Not so Russia, where oil provides 50% of government income.

The long-term outlook for global oil prices is lower, perhaps much lower, giving a strong boost to the U.S. economy while potentially crippling the economy of Vladimir Putin's Russia. Vast new discoveries of oil and natural gas in the U.S. and around the globe could drive the oil price to as low as $75 a barrel over the next five years from a current $100....MORE
Okay he wasn't aggressive enough on the time frame and a couple of the details weren't quite right but we got to $75, and at a time when most prognosticators were leaning the other way, big time. I thought it important enough to reprise the following Tuesday when Barron's ungated the story:
REPOST--Barron's Cover: "Here Comes $75 Oil" (Special Bonus: Did Someone Frontrun Michael Lewis?)