Wednesday
Sep012010
Oil Inventories
Wednesday, September 1, 2010 at 11:18AM With a build of over 3 million barrels in the latest week, oil inventories continue to swell. As shown in the chart, even though we are now in the period of the year when oil stockpiles typically decline, this year they are moving in the opposite direction. As a result, inventories are near their highest levels this year, and relative to the historical average, they're higher than at any other point this year.
Reader Comments (1)
This is interesting, especially that inventories are rising when they normally fall this time of year. I've heard some analysts citing these stats recently and using it to say that oil prices will fall sharply, perhaps even by more than 50%! While 30 million more barrels than average sounds like a lot, it's only about 10 percent of historic average inventory. More importantly, these averages go back to 1984 so it covers periods of much lower economic activity. Could the higher inventory levels be telling us something about future global economic activity picking up pace?