I've known for almost 20 years that the petroleum markets at all levels have massive amounts of price manipulation. All sorts of counterintuitive things happen at the same time. The price of crude goes down, but the price of gasoline goes up. The price of gasoline goes down, but the price of diesel goes up. Normal seasonal variations don't hold true, but no one knows why. Five refineries coincidentally shut down for planned maintenance at the same time, creating a weird spike. So much storage fills up at once that there's no longer any capacity available to actually ship the stuff. I've seen all of this and more.
We all know OPEC + Russia are massive players in all of this. I stumbled over this today, though...there's a guy here in the USA who colludes with them and has the power to move markets. One man! Imagine that. https://prospect.org/power/2024-05-07-mega-donor-scott-sheffield-opec-exxonmobil/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Who%20Created%20the%20Israel-Palestine%20Conflict%3F%20%7C%20Weekend%20Reads&utm_campaign=Weekend%20Prospect%20Reads%205102024
We all know OPEC + Russia are massive players in all of this. I stumbled over this today, though...there's a guy here in the USA who colludes with them and has the power to move markets. One man! Imagine that. https://prospect.org/power/2024-05-07-mega-donor-scott-sheffield-opec-exxonmobil/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Who%20Created%20the%20Israel-Palestine%20Conflict%3F%20%7C%20Weekend%20Reads&utm_campaign=Weekend%20Prospect%20Reads%205102024