I Was Wrong About Oil

Well, I was wrong. 

It turns out that oil didn’t hit $1 million per barrel in July. 

Imagine our shock when the price of oil didn’t go that high. 

But you know what? It didn’t hit $400 per barrel like former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned was imminent should countries impose a price cap on Russian oil, nor did it hit the $380 per barrel that J.P. Morgan was calling for in the headlines this summer. 

Some people couldn’t even keep $200 oil out of their mouths in the months leading up to the summer driving season.

I know, I know, those were some pretty outlandish oil predictions.

Yet oil didn’t even hit the more “down-to-earth” call by Goldman Sachs that oil was on the verge of hitting $140 per barrel. 

Truth is, the bears won the near-term price projection battle. Citigroup came closer than most after it suggested oil was about to plummet to $65 per barrel if a global recession set in.

Of course, you know just as well as I do what happened next.

Oil prices briefly touched $120 per barrel in June and then came crashing down below $90 per barrel today.

Look, you can ignore the outlandish predictions by Wall Street’s biggest investment firms that refuse to tell you how they’re maneuvering behind the scenes. If someone is calling for $200/bbl oil, it’s probably because they’re selling at $120. 

So has oil finally peaked? Are prices finally going to turn a hard left crash to the good old days when crude was negative $40 per barrel? 

Of course not. We saw the perfect storm that was in place for that wildly historic oil crash in 2020. And no matter how scary the headlines get over COVID, I think it’s safe to assume the U.S. won’t ever lock down like that again. 

But that doesn’t mean oil can’t head lower. 

If there’s only one thing I try to impart to my readers, it’s the need to follow the fundamentals. 

And in the case of crude oil, the single most important factor for a bearish price correction is demand destruction.

If you’re wondering why oil prices fell precipitously to under $90 per barrel as I write this, it’s because the market is worried about demand destruction. 

And over the last two weeks, the headlines have been flooded with concerns over demand destruction. 

But let’s look directly at the numbers before we jump aboard the bear train. 

Over the last three weeks, the EIA has reported declines in U.S. gasoline demand. Even the Fourth of July weekend was a bit of a bummer for demand. 

At first glance, this may be a signal that demand destruction is starting to set in. 

Although this may be the case, I’m not entirely convinced. 

When the EIA reported its most recent numbers, it showed that our gasoline demand last week was approximately 8.5 million barrels.

However, we might want to ask ourselves if there aren't some shenanigans at play. 

Think about it…

With gasoline demand around 8.5 million barrels per day, that’s LESS THAN it was during July 2020, when we were guzzling 8.6 million barrels of gasoline per day. Don’t take my word for it — you can check it out yourself, straight from the EIA. 

Something just doesn’t seem quite right, does it? 

Our largest petroleum refiners have reported that they haven't seen signs yet of demand destruction. 

If that’s the case, we may be in for a wild ride.

Why?

Well, always keep the supply-side situation in mind. 

And in this case, let’s remember that President Biden is tapping into our Strategic Petroleum Reserve in a last-ditch effort to reduce prices at the pump. 

We’re selling nearly 1 million barrels of crude oil from the SPR into the market every day, and that honeypot is going to stop in October. 

Now, if demand destruction HAS set in, we’ll be able to start refilling our low inventories of crude oil, and we can all start to recover this winter when oil prices are seasonally at their lowest. 

However, if demand hasn’t gone away, like the industry is warning us about right now, we’ll be in for a bumpy ride when that SPR well goes dry.

And if that ends up being the case, there’s only one sector I'd want to be in. 

I’ll tell you all about it — as well as three elite oil stocks inside it — right here.

Until next time,

Keith Kohl

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A true insider in the technology and energy markets, Keith’s research has helped everyday investors capitalize from the rapid adoption of new technology trends and energy transitions. Keith connects with hundreds of thousands of readers as the Managing Editor of Energy & Capital, as well as the investment director of Angel Publishing’s Energy Investor and Technology and Opportunity.

For nearly two decades, Keith has been providing in-depth coverage of the hottest investment trends before they go mainstream — from the shale oil and gas boom in the United States to the red-hot EV revolution currently underway. Keith and his readers have banked hundreds of winning trades on the 5G rollout and on key advancements in robotics and AI technology.

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