Reading Time: 3 minutes Reuters – Global shortages of middle distillates such as diesel, gas oil and heating oil are intensifying rather than easing, making it more likely a relatively severe slowdown in the business cycle will be necessary to rebalance the market. U.S. inventories of distillate fuel oil fell to 106 million barrels in early October, the lowest […] Read more
Opinion: It’s not just oil production that’s keeping diesel prices high
Refinery production has fallen since the pandemic, and that’s unlikely to change
Opinion: It’s not just oil prices — refining capacity is driving up fuel bills
Fat margins mean refineries have plenty of reasons to up production but they have limited capacity
Reading Time: 3 minutes Reuters – Global stocks of refined petroleum products have fallen to critically low levels as refineries prove unable to keep up with surging demand especially for the diesel-like fuels used in manufacturing and freight transportation. The result has been a surge in prices refiners receive for selling fuels compared with prices they pay for buying […] Read more
Kemp: Commodity markets will go dark if U.S. shutdown continues
If the U.S. government shutdown continues for more than a few days, commodity markets will find themselves flying blind, as the public servants responsible for producing statistics on which traders and investors rely are sent home. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) said Tuesday it will not publish the commitments of traders and other market […] Read more
U.S. farmers are withdrawing unsustainable amounts from aquifers
Reading Time: 2 minutes Reuters / American farmers are withdrawing unsustainable volumes of groundwater to irrigate crops, resulting in an accelerating decline in aquifers across the central and western U.S., according to a new report by the U.S. Geological Survey. Groundwater resources have shrunk by 1,000 cubic kilometres since 1900 — about double the total amount of water contained […] Read more
Price bubbles and commodity markets
Reading Time: 2 minutes Athoughtful new paper from researchers at the University of Illinois marks a significant step forward in research on how commodity futures prices are formed. Until recently, the academic and policy debate about futures price formation has been locked in an acrimonious and polarized standoff between market fundamentalists, who insist all price moves reflect supply-and-demand fundamentals, […] Read more
Price bubbles and commodity markets
Reading Time: 2 minutes Reuters / A thoughtful new paper from researchers at the University of Illinois marks a significant step forward in research on how commodity futures prices are formed. Until recently, the academic and policy debate about futures price formation has been locked in an acrimonious and polarized standoff between market fundamentalists, who insist all price moves […] Read more
In Other Words, Throwing A Dart Is Just As Good
Reading Time: 2 minutes Enormous resources are now being poured into commodity price forecasting but a thoughtful paper by the New York Fed casts doubt on whether it is likely to be successful. In a 2010 working paper on “Commodity prices, commodity currencies, and global economic developments” and now featured on the New York Fed’s website, Jan Groen and […] Read more
Don’t Get Carried Away By The Farmland Hype
Reading Time: 3 minutes Parallel stories quoting the same leading economist appearing to say contradictory things about investment in farmland bring a wry smile and provide a lesson in the importance of psychology and behavioural approaches to finance. Investment News,which describes itself as the leading news source for financial advisers, has renowned Yale Professor Robert Shiller advising investors to […] Read more
Cyber-Savvy Farmer
