Posted on 10/14/2008 2:27:34 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
NEW YORK – Oil prices fell below $79 a barrel in choppy trading Tuesday as investors took profits from the previous day's rally and shifted their focus back to signs of dwindling world energy demand.
A falling U.S. stock market, a day after a record-breaking advance, also weighed on crude prices as oil market traders continued to fixate on equities as a barometer for the overall confidence in the shaky world economy.
At the pump, retail gas price kept dropping. A gallon of regular dropped 4.3 cents overnight to a new national average of $3.163, according to auto club AAA, the Oil Price Information Service and Wright Express. That's a 23 percent slide from the record average of $4.14 reached July 17.
Investors generally have reacted positively to the U.S. government's plan to spend $250 billion to buy stock in banks. Nine major banks will initially participate in the extraordinary measure aimed at unclogging stalled credit markets and restoring confidence in the wider economy. That followed Monday's news that European governments were putting up over $2 trillion to safeguard their own banks.
The Dow Jones industrial average fluctuated for most of the day before ending 76 points lower, a day after soaring to its biggest point gain ever and largest percentage gain since 1933.
Andrew Lebow, senior vice president and broker at MF Global in New York, said "oil is still following equity markets" but noted that fears of a demand-crushing U.S. recession despite a litany of bailout measures is also prompting traders to sell crude.
"On a historical basis, $80 a barrel is still very expensive," Lebow said. "The economy clearly proved that it couldn't handle prices at well above $100, so what's equilibrium price? We have no idea."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Seems like cheap oil is a good thing. But then again there will be no pressure to develop our own resources. Always the double edged sword.
..also , correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t oil always fall right before we elect head idiot?
What? I thought all the prancing economists on Wall Street said $200 a barrel.....apparently the stock market is nothing more than a bunch of asshats at a crap table in Los Vegas. Hehehehehe
yeah, whats with that???
Wait!! I hear silence.............crickets, chirp, chirp.............
Since gasoline prices were $4 per gallon at around $145 per barrel of oil, shouldn’t gasoline be around $2.25 at $79 per barrel? Is gas prices slow fall while oil is going down? It seems to catch up VERY quickly when oil prices increase.
Here in Iowa, gas is down to $2.56 a gallon. Corn has fallen to just over $4.20 a bushel, making ethanol much less profitable.
Gas in this mid Ohio town, is going for $2.90 a gal.
Looks like you got sent on 'vacation'. What did you do? lol
It is!!! If only we'd stand up to the GovernMental EnvironMentalists and NIMBY's and drill and refine in our own back yard regardless of cheapness.
When T. Boone and all the leftists keep up the chorus that we're sending $700 billion "overseas," it's a bogus statement because we only send a fraction "overseas!" Most of it goes overland to Canada and Mexico and overland ain't overseas!!!
I hope we're crankin up the buys from Khadafi who has given up on nukes and terrorism and has some of the finest, lightest crude oil on Earth!!! (and that ain't in the middle east. It's in Africa)
Good! We din't need M.T.B.E. or any other gasoline additive like ethanol to have clean burning gas anyways!!!
It's all been a big fat swindle and a huge lie like "Oil For Food!" (except ethanol was food for oil)
LOL!!!
That has to be one of the best profile pages I’ve ever seen!
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