Oil Plunges to Lowest Level in Four Years

Today on the New York Mercantile Exchange, oil fell to its lowest level in four years, dropping to $36.22 at the end of the trading day. That was a 9.6 percent or $3.84 plunge per barrel for January delivery.

While trading volume was higher for February, it still fell $2.94 to finish the session at $41.67 a barrel on the NYMEX.

OPEC is of course panicking at the potential unrest that will inevitably come if prices continue to fall, and so cut production by another 4.2 billion more barrels a day on Wednesday, but that hasn't impressed traders much, as assertions and practical cooperation are two different things. Many countries say they'll participate in cutbacks historically, but full cooperation rarely, if ever, happens.

Price is the driving force behind the decline, as economic weakness is causing consumers to cut back on driving. If prices were to go higher at this time, consumers would simply cut back more. It's not a good time for OPEC, and it could become an even more dangerous situation going forward in a number of the countries that are part of the organization.

It'll be difficult to develop a supply/demand balance going forward, as economic uncertainty and the unknown continue to hamper stability. Whenever that becomes stable, the price range is expected to flucuate by around $15 a barrel.

January gasoline on Globex also moved down with oil, as prices drooped 5 cents to finish at 92 cents a gallon. Heating oil followed suit, ending down by 7 cents to $1.37 a gallon.

Scott Bleier Predicts Oil will Fall to $50 a Barrel

Scott Bleier was right in mid-July when he said the commodity boom was going to go through a correction, and with that correction oil would fall to $100 a barrel.

He was wrong only in that it has fallen far below that, and now Scott says it'll fall as low as $50 a barrel. He could very well be right.

Forced liquidation of commodities by large funds, as well as decreased demand, could pressure it even lower than $50.

OPEC's upcoming emergency session where they're expected to decrease daily oil production by 1 million a day in order to stop the price plunge, probably won't have the desired effect, and oil will continue to fall.

Oil Prices Will Continue to Fall

There's no question that the trend for oil prices has changed, and for a period of time we'll see that trend continue down.

A major reason I believe this will happen is the nature of trends themselves; it simply takes time for a trend to stop and turn itself around. The reason it takes time is because a trend is simply the response of human beings to a situation, and most human beings are slow to catch on and change.

In other words, people will neglect the underlying fundamentals at times of emotional turbulence and simply follow the crowd. Many times they do it as "bulls" and other times they do it as "bears." We are seeing the bears rear their heads in oil now, and that isn't going to stop in the short term.

While we know over a period of time that demand will start to surge again, as American consumers start to increase their driving again, and emerging market giants like China and India increase their acquisition of oil, and other commodities as well, we also know that they're cutting back on buying now, and that slowdown should continue.

One factor that could slow down this trend is if OPEC slashes production so much that it drives the cost of oil artificially above its market price. That could happen next month when they get together in an unprecedented emergency session to decide on what to do with the oil price drop.

We very well could see oil prices plunge much further before they begin their inevitable climb back up. Much of that will be determined by how long the fear factor reminds in the psyche of consumers, which has caused them to lower their consumption practices.