Economic Issues Independent Research Assignment

Over the past few years oil prices have been dropping. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (eig.gov), a barrel of oil cost $86.07 on October 20, 2013. As of October 20, 2015 a barrel of oil

The reason of the fall in oil prices are the constant change of demand. The need for the oil is actually stagnant. Crude oil is becoming a product of the past. Today, you can harvest energy from solar, wind, water, heat, and waves. According to The Economist, “The use of fossil fuels in the rich world is mostly falling. Emerging economies are not currently taking up the slack”.

The U.S. was supposed to be the world’s new swing oil producer, able to nimbly open and close the taps in response to market forces, thanks to its bounty of shale fields.” In the past a barrel of oil has been one hundred dollars, recently it has dropped to thirty dollars. Though some wells can be profitable at low prices it puts a serious strain on the oil industry as explained in this article.

Within the last year, oil prices in the United States have dropped significantly. As oil drilling in the United States has reached its highest level in over 30 years, consumers are reaping the benefits. Among these gains are record-low prices at the pump, and cheaper oil to heat homes. However, oil prices did not just drop on their own; multiple factors contributed to the fall. Increased domestic production, declining global demand, and competition from other oil-producing nations had led to rapidly dropping oil prices across the United States.

From 2014, the crude oil price has dropped in a sudden since the global economic downturn, oversupply of crude oil and the appearance of new energy. Global economy fatigued, and thus the demand of crude oil was not strong,

For example, the Intercontinental Exchange while oil prices have not been decided on by oil producers such as Niami refinery fires, Nigerian Pirates and global oil markets. The laws of demand and supply are also predicted by the increase and decrease in the prices of oil. Oil prices are driven by the increase in demand for oil which has limited or completely destroyed the gains for suppliers and producers. While the U.S still consumes more oil than any other country, it is evident from the increase in oil demand that developing countries such as China, India and Japan are driving oil prices higher by their continous growth in oil demand (Anderson, 1).

In the recent months, the prices of crude oil have dropped from 140 dollars per barrel to 60 dollars a barrel in the latest date. To begin with, there is technological revolution in the energy extraction referred to as “fracking” which has significantly increased supply of natural gas and petroleum in the America, allowing them not to depend heavily on the foreign sources of crude oil. Secondly, Saudi Arabia and the other countries

The supply for oil is way more than its demand, causing the prices over the U.S. to continually fall. The Federal Reserve plans on monitoring inflation, and they hope to get it to decrease back to its original expected

The article entitled “4 Reasons Why the Price of Crude Oil Dropped” by Evan Tarver offer some of the possible reasons. According to Tarver the strength of the US dollar could be one of the reason for drop in the oil prices. Tarver also reveals that Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) is unwilling to stabilize the oil market and this has an effect on the oil prices. Other reasons identified in the article include the oversupply of the crude and the declining of the demand.

Oil-The article”OPEC #1”explains the oil prices.The Oil of the Middle East is the price of oil has fallen by nearly half in just six months.Anyone who buys oil or gas is happy because the prices are low.Car and truck drivers, airlines, and shipping companies are all happy because they don't have to spend as much money on gas. Oil companies are not very happy. They are losing money.A barrel of oil now costs $58 and last summer it was $107.Oil prices have gone down and people are happy,at least some of

Until the above said period, the OPEC countries were the main producers of the natural oil and they worked as the cartel and they determined the quantity to be produced based on the market demand and they kept the price at a higher rate and prevented the fall of the price by reducing the production of oil. The introduction of the shale oil made the problem. The higher demand and lower supply of

Graph 1 represents the major companies and nations which product crude oil. It also represents how the bent crude oil price has fluctuated from 2004 until 2014. From 2004-2008 it is evident that there is a steady rise in oil prices, from $35-$150 per barrel. Towards the end of 2008 it is evident that there is a significant drop in oil prices, from $150- $32 per barrel. This is due to the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) where the stock market collapsed on October 28, 1928, through this came the rapid decrease in oil prices. From 2009-2011 there is a steady increase in oil prices which was caused by the stock market repairing itself from impact of the GFC. In 2013 we are able to see declining oil

Comparing this to the world oil price in that same time period, there seems to be an overall positive relationship between oil price and imports and exports. The price rises about $50/barrel over three years until a sudden spike in 2007-2008, then drops dramatically before sharply rising again (Figure 2). The drop in total imports and exports in 2012 does not seem to be correlated with price, since there is an upward trend in price from 2009-2013. Aside from that year, it appears that there is an overall positive correlation between total imports and exports of oil and the price of oil, suggesting that because oil is an essential commodity, demand is much more inelastic than supply. Thus, imports rise when prices are high even though it is disadvantageous for importers because exporters are willing to provide a larger quantity and importers are less sensitive to price.

What is causing the sudden decline in oil prices? A. There is an increase in the supply of oil but the demand has decreased due to interest in energy efficiency. a. The production of oil in the United States has doubled in the last several years (Krauss). b. The price for a barrel of oil is around $30 dollars compared to over $100 in 2014 (Bowler).

Shale revolution started about ten years ago due to technological developments such horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing. The increasing exploitation of shale oil significantly affected the oil market. In this report, WTI oil price was predicted over the next five years using historical data. A discussion of major factors that historically affected oil prices is presented. Historical events were linked to current and expected future events to evaluate the predicted prices. To further evaluate the forecasted prices, they were compared to the predicted prices by the Economy Forecast Agency.