RV Fuel Issues & Prices - Post 'Em Here!

[Dick_A]

All other fuel threads will be automatically deleted. 🙂

[rather_be_travl]

There's good news and bad news.
The good news is fuel is down to a "reasonable" price.
The bad news is my IRA has taken such a hit I can't afford it anyway.

I should qualify that by saying we can't afford a lot of recreational travel except on the Gold Wing, and some occasional camping closer to home.

[Fezziwig]

Sometimes funny things happen.

Down on Whipple road the Shell station, suurounded on all sides by guys discounting to $1.75 and below, gave up and in exasperation posted prices a dollar higher than anybody else, like $2.75!

And a few months ago while prices were high, the Rancho station in Los Altos posted a price of $9.99 (self-serve, cash only!) for premium. Then he sold the station.

[8_1_Van]

"Gasoline prices well under $1 at the new Sprint gas station, left, and the Kent's Korner, both on East Pine Log Road, led to backed up traffic as frugal drivers looked to fill their tanks.

The battle over who could have the lowest gas prices and attract the most customers continued on East Pine Log Road on Friday.

The new Sprint station and Exxon saw their prices fall from 97 cents in the morning to 89 cents in the early evening hours as each attempted to keep pace with the other. Circle K dropped its price from $1.37 to 99 cents Friday to join the competition. "

gas wars

[Fezziwig]

Here's a pertinent citation from the Department Of Energy:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/otheranalysis/ongr.html

"The projections in the OCS access case indicate that access to the Pacific, Atlantic, and eastern Gulf regions would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030....any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant."

[Fezziwig]

A blessing of reduced consumption: prices are driven down!

See, conservation works!

[8_1_Van]

Gas as low as $1.09 at Shell when using a Shell Mastercard that gives 10% off for the first 60 days and 5% after that.

[bid_time]

Got it, I understand now. Speculators manipulate the price to extort money out of us poor suckers. But now when the price is so low, they just don't feel like doing it anymore, not even a little bit. They probably feel sorry for us or something, or maybe they got so much money out of us the last time they can't spend it all.

[AO_hitech]

bid_time wrote:
Soon as demand went down, price went down.

No, it did not. The demand was going down as the price was going up. And the supply was increased and the price STILL went up.

The changes in demand and supply (a few percentage points) were fairly small. The change in price (a few hundred percentage points) was huge.

[bid_time]

AO_hitech wrote:

ronharmless wrote:
That is not what you said before. You look back on page 104 you said speculators "Manipulated" the market. You also have said "Supply and Demand" had very little influence on the market (I can give you some page numbers if you need them). So I go back to my question. Why aren't speculators "manipulating" the market to their benefit now? Nothing else except supply and demand has changed.

Why? Why does any huge group of people act the way they do? "They" decided the price was as high as it was going to get and cashed out. That's one possibility. Another is that "they" were afraid the economy couldn't handle the price going any higher and cashed out. Who knows.

The speculators are a huge group and manipulated the price of oil by continuing to purchase futures. They were able to do this because they collectively acted the same and continued to purchase futures. When enough of them decided to cash out the price collapsed. This is VERY typical of radically inflated prices; the bubble bursts.

Man I must really be ingnorant. Soon as demand went down, price went down. Soon as the price hit a low that OPEC felt was to low, they cut the supply to try and jack the price back up.

Thought that was always indicative of Supply and Demand. Man I must be stiupid! It's called "speculators manipulating the market" - geez do I feel dumb!

[Fezziwig]

If speculators could make the price go up or down as they please, then they could make money either way by playing futures. In fact, they could make money on the ups and downs even if they couldn't control prices but they could successfully predict them.

Prescient speculators make money both ways.

[SRT]

Well, gas prices went up only $.05 a gallon while oil dropped in price. I suppose the gas prices went up because it is the Christmas season. I thought just maybe the price would remain the same. The oil companies are doing their usual rip off of the consumer. 😞

[AO_hitech]

ronharmless wrote:
If speculators can control the market, why aren't they making the price go up now? Seems like if I could control the market, it would be a perfect opportunity to make up for your loses or pile on more wealth.

First, it's not ONE speculator. It is a group. Second, we have all said manipulate, not control. When conditions are right, a large speculator can influence the rest of the market; but the conditions are not right, yet anyway.

[bid_time]

ronharmless wrote:

Hurricaner wrote:

Why aren't speculators "manipulating" the market to their benefit now? Nothing else except supply and demand has changed.

Because all the speculators are broke. When oil prices started to collapse they lost there collective asses. Kinda like the guys that manipulated housing prices, you know, the ones we are bailing out right now.

Sam

Whether they lost money when the price went down or whether they could forsee the bottom falling out and sold short has nothing at all to do with the question. The question is: If speculators can control the market, why aren't they making the price go up now? Seems like if I could control the market, it would be a perfect opportunity to make up for your loses or pile on more wealth.

Oh c'mon ron, you are trying to use logic, that won't work in this case. Some people are governed by emotion. They hear someone on radio or TV, or read something in the paper and it strikes an emotional nerve with them. And they take it to heart, it becomes a part of their inner being, and they can feel it deep inside them, and they say "that must be true". At that point evidence and logic no longer have any part in the equation. It's all emotional. You're using logic against an emotional beast and you're wasting your time.

[ronharmless]

Hurricaner wrote:

Why aren't speculators "manipulating" the market to their benefit now? Nothing else except supply and demand has changed.

Because all the speculators are broke. When oil prices started to collapse they lost there collective asses. Kinda like the guys that manipulated housing prices, you know, the ones we are bailing out right now.

Sam

Whether they lost money when the price went down or whether they could forsee the bottom falling out and sold short has nothing at all to do with the question. The question is: If speculators can control the market, why aren't they making the price go up now? Seems like if I could control the market, it would be a perfect opportunity to make up for your loses or pile on more wealth.

[Dick_A]

Hurricaner wrote:
Kinda like the guys that manipulated housing prices, you know, the ones we are bailing out right now. Sam

Yes, Sam has it right. The ones we are bailing out right now should be hanging out to dry on a close line in Alaska.