The market has hit an interesting point because the bad news today was such that despite the bullish outlook from the lingering effects of Hurricane Irene and the expected effects of Tropical Storm Lee, the bearish stark reality of a recessionary economy really came to the forefront. On Fridays it is normally good to look at price movements from the vantage point of a week to temper the daily volatility of the markets. Today, however, it will be instructive to consider the reality of a failed summer for gasoline demand and the impending fall of more demand deterioration as the double dip recession is more and more accepted as fact and unemployment stays high amid greater economic uncertainty. When the new unemployment numbers were announced today with all media sources talking about the "unexpected" nature of the stagnant job market, it became obvious that the U.S. economy is not getting better. Immediately equities fell and crude followed. One can only speculate what the real number of new jobs and unemployment claims are since they are always revised a week or so later and the time spread cushions the effect on the market.
On a week to week basis, gasoline is down only 1.8% but just from yesterday's settlement to today's gasoline had fallen 3.2%. To be trending positive and then have the bottom fall out is significant. Crude analyzed from week to week shows +1.3%but just looking at the movement from the first day of the month to the second, the fall is -2.8%. Today's jobless numbers, especially no new jobs created during the month of August, reveals a very faltering economy.
For the week, WTI +$1.08, $86.45; Brent +$1.83, $$113.19; RBOB -9.5¢, $2.8396; HO +1.27¢, $2.9974.
No comments:
Post a Comment