Nickname: sixpicker

Review: Did anyone notice how easy it is to pay $3 a gallon today? Last year we were horrified to pay $2.50. Once a price threshold has been breached, consumers feel much more comfortable paying the 'going rate'. Now... My point is this: Fuel prices plateaued for a decade, but costs and inflation rose, just as it did with soda pop. For 15 years, a soda was 99 cents, then suddenly it went up 30% to $1.29. Oil has done the same thing. Only oil is depleteing, and soda is an unlimited commodity. The rarer anything, the more demand for less available product drives price up. We WILL see $100 - $200 a barrel oil in our lifetime. Even if General BushII commits our entire military into the aquisition and control of oil in the Middle East. There is only so much to go around and we keep needing more. the answer... get used to it. Just like we have gotten used to $100,000 salaries and $300,000 homes. The TRUTH... it's all relative as were nickel beers and $100 mortgages in the 1940's.

Date reviewed: Aug 24, 2006 9:07 PM

Nickname: mck

Review: The problem as I see it is, that there is one excuse after another why prices keep on rising. In my opinion it is all a bunch of lies. Why couldn't BP shut down the east, repair it, then shut down the west side and repair it. Why can't BP make other arrangements to get the oil from point A to point B. Since this is the largest oil field in our country why wasn't there an alternate plan to get the oil where it needs to go (i.e. an emergency pipe line to take over in the event that one breaks down. It is only good business! I work in the banking field and we are required to have an alternate plan to operate.

Date reviewed: Aug 8, 2006 4:03 PM

Nickname: JK

Review: Here's the tab for the oil: http://zfacts.com/p/196.html Here's conservatives not being very conservative. Debt as % of GDP: http://zfacts.com/p/318.html

Date reviewed: Jul 29, 2006 12:57 AM

Nickname: JK

Review: The other energy sources do need to be persued as well. Photovoltaics are good but need to be produced more cheaply. Parabolic solar collectors linked to stirling engines look promising as well. Electricity producers have a green light to build nuclear but when they look at the cost, they aren't scrambling for permits. We will never get the equivalent of a Manhattan Project unless we switch to public campaign financing. The major oil companies will not allow meaningful energy policy until the oil reserves are exhausted at top dollar. They will allow a gradual creep to ethanol in that they will still control the refining, blending and distribution. ADM will control the raw material supply. China will demand 300 million cars in the next decade or two. They have little arable land so we will be selling them ethanol. Unforunately, with the supply being exported there will be little relief at the pump for us.

Date reviewed: Jul 27, 2006 3:22 PM

Nickname: JK

Review: The ethanol bandwagon may not be so bad if you keep the politicians constrained. You are correct in regard to corn based ethanol production but enzyme technology is making other non-fertilizer consuming crops viable.

Date reviewed: Jul 27, 2006 3:21 PM

Nickname: senatortom

Review: I dearly hope we are not so foolish as to get on the ethanol bandwagon. How could any reasonable person advocate a technology that uses more energy in its production than it will ever provide? Only politicians could make such an absurd policy decision. With the proper president in office what we need is the equivalent of the Manhattan Project for alternative energy. Photovoltaics and solar water heating should be far less costly and more efficient than is currently available. Third generation nuclear power could well be the safest, cleanest power ever generated. Unfortunately, we now have so few suppliers of parts they can work at full capacity and not meet demand. What we are is a very lazy country that has taken our status and wealth for granted, and now that wealth is being redistributed. Classic case of Econ 101. Lastly, what idiot ever allowed oil and gas futures trading? Anyone with a few bucks can speculate, and it has a very unsettling effect on the world economy.

Date reviewed: Jul 27, 2006 8:06 AM

Nickname: JK

Review: In response to Webspin. I work too hard as a capitalist American to have my capital stolen by OPEC setting production limits in collusion with non-OPEC producers. Or supplying gas to our armed forces through Haliburton at four times the local price. Or shutting down refineries to maintain supply constriction. Whatever you are driving makes you a wasteful fellow American also compared to the guy on a bicycle. Let's all walk everywhere so as not to be labeled irresponsible!

Date reviewed: Jul 25, 2006 5:27 PM

Nickname: Robert R

Review: As long as the Federal government does things like failing to maintain Amtrak equipment and infrastructure (Clinton) and firing gung ho officials who were trying to do something about our problems, like David Gunn (Bush II), nobody will believe that we mind paying higher and higher energy prices. Shame on both parties for not admitting that we need a number of minor changes packaged together, rather than grandstanding.

Date reviewed: Jul 25, 2006 3:39 PM

Nickname: webspin

Review: Most of the posters on this thread should be embarrassed to consider themselves Americans and capitalists. The simple fact is that consumers continue to use more fuel every year. If the price of oil were "too high," then the wasteful SUVs and Quad cab pickups would start to disappear from the roadways (or would have never even been purchased to start with!). Sadly this hasn't happened and I continue to pay expensive fuel prices because of my wasteful fellow Americans!

Date reviewed: Jul 25, 2006 3:08 AM

Nickname: bhessel

Review: Crude, you're asking two different questions. First you ask about the effect of $100 oil on XOM eps, and then you ask about the effect on valuation. The first question is more complex because there are many variables to consider (e.g., how much oil the company is buying on the open market -- if any -- to supplement their own production, how the higher price influences where they drill -- and thus their internal cost per barrel, the potential for demand destruction for refined products at that price level, and others. Good luck! The second is relatively simpler: To get a rough idea, calculate the portion of XOM's overall business that is devoted to E&P (back out the refining, retail, and chemical LOBs) and derive that fraction of the share price. You then need to estimate the fraction of that fraction which reflects the valuation of XOM's reserves at $70/bbls oil and multiply that per share value by 10/7ths to see what $100 oil will do.

Date reviewed: Jul 24, 2006 4:59 PM