Market Volatility Remains The Name Of The Oil Game

Oil prices continue the rollercoaster ride. After trading lower late last week, oil prices moved higher in Monday’s action, with West Texas Crude up roughly 3.5% to just over $108 per barrel. This comes off of Wednesday and Thursday’s drop, where oil prices were trading in the mid-$90s range. Pippa Stevens with CNBC says the past two weeks have been anything but typical.

“As one person told me this market has been trading exclusively on emotion; fear on the way up, and hope on the way down as there are now indications supply chain disruptions may not be as bad as once feared.”

Stevens noted with emotion dictating where the prices are going, it’s really hard to know where the markets are going next.

“What it really shows is these are people who are not really active in the energy market, all of this knee jerk reaction both on the way up and this dramatic way down.  I mean, these 8% volatility swings; that’s not normal.  And so this is people who don’t actually know what’s going on, we don’t have new indications and this is just trading all over the place.”

The latest report from OPEC+, shows some producers are still falling short of their agreed supply quotas, which is adding additional strain on the oil market.

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