Kalau harga minyak dunia jatuh di bawah 50 usd/barrel, berarti BBM kita harus jauh lebih turun, bukan di level Rp.7600,-/liter, kecuali Pak Jokowi memang mau cari uang dari penderitaan rakyat. --------------------------------------------------------------- Listrik, Elpiji, Tarif Kereta, Tarif Angkot, sembako, dst juga naik. --------------------------------------------------------------- U.S. Oil Prices Fall Below $50 a Barrel Ample Supplies, Tepid Demand Have Prompted Plunge in Oil Prices -------------------------------------------------------------- Oleh NICOLE FRIEDMAN And GEORGI KANTCHEV --------------------------------------------------------------- U.S. oil prices DROPPED BELOW $50 a barrel MONDAY for the first time since April 2009 on concerns that the market will remain oversupplied in the coming months. Ample oil production, particularly in the U.S., and tepid demand growth have sent oil prices plunging in recent months. Consumers are reaping the benefits, while oil-exporting nations are struggling to balance their fiscal budgets and oil companies are seeing their stock prices slump. Light, sweet oil for February delivery traded as low as $49.95 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices recently traded down $2.32, or 4.4%, at $50.37 a barrel. Brent crude for February delivery traded down $3.34, or 5.9%, at $53.08 a barrel. Both oil benchmarks have been down for six consecutive weeks, extending their nearly 50% slide from last year. “When it rains, it pours,” said Chip Hodge, senior managing director at John Hancock Financial Services, who helps oversee about $7 billion in energy-related investments. “It just seems that you get bad news on top of bad news” for oil prices, he said. Oil prices tumbled at the start of the new year on reports that Russian oil output has hit post-Soviet records, while Iraqi oil exports are at their highest since the 1980s. “We already have an ample supply of oil and on top of that we see this increase from Iraq and Russia,” said Michael Hewson, analyst at CMC Markets. “The momentum clearly continues to be bearish for oil.” The strength of the dollar, now at multiyear highs against other major currencies, also exacerbated the slump in oil. Oil is traded in dollars, so a STRONG DOLLARS MAKES OIL MORE EXPENSIVE for FOREIGN BUYERS. In the U.S., the national average price of retail GASOLINE is $2.20 a gallon, according to AAA, and 40 states had at least one station selling GAS for less than $2 a gallon on Monday. The oil glut is likely to increase, said Morgan Stanley, as new production will continue to ramp up at a number of fields in West Africa, Brazil, the U.S. and Canada. Many of these projects were well under way before prices fell. The demand outlook is also weak, analysts said, due to lackluster economic data out of China and Europe. On Sunday, Citigroup lowered its average Brent forecast for 2015 to $63 from $80 a barrel, and its average WTI projection to $55 from $72 a barrel, the bank said in a report titled “Oil and Trouble Ahead in 2015.” Brokerage and research firm Bernstein has lowered its Brent crude-oil price forecasts to $80 a barrel for 2015 from $100 a barrel, and to $90 a barrel for 2016 from $109 a barrel, but it said it believes that oil prices will return to triple digits by 2017 as U.S. shale growth wanes. Jameel Ahmad, chief market analyst at ForexTime Prices, said the free fall in prices was creating uncertainty in the oil industry, with further mergers and takeovers expected as oil producers struggle to adapt to lower prices. “This would provide the industry with an uncertain future, likely spooking investors into pricing in further declines for the commodity,” Mr. Ahmad said. Later this week, markets will be focused on U.S. nonfarm payrolls data. Stronger-than-expected jobs data would likely boost the dollar and put further downward pressure on oil prices. U.S. producers are responding to low prices by cutting their 2015 spending, which is expected to eventually slow U.S. supply growth. Plummeting prices could prompt some oil-exporting nations to reduce output, Mr. Hodge said. Of $50-a-barrel oil, “I’d be a little flabbergasted to see how it could stay below that price for a long period of time,” he said. “There’s going to be too much pain for a lot of places.” Gasoline futures for February delivery fell 6.19 cents, or 4.3%, to $1.3715 a gallon. Diesel futures fell 4.67 cents, or 2.6%, to $1.7490 a gallon.
Posted on: Mon, 05 Jan 2015 17:19:32 +0000