Well, it didn't take long for the shorts to jump.

Commodity analysts at Standard Chartered pointed out that the price undershooting was the consequence of a combination of several factors including extreme macroeconomic pessimism, speculative shorts and over-enthusiastic algorithmic trading that crowded out more fundamentally-based traders. Consequently, oil futures markets flipped to a net short position in Brent, compared with a net long position at the end of the previous week.

It's only 2024!  lol.  2029 is still 5 years away!

Joining the Saudis to go to the mat with the shorts, StanChart is predicting a supply deficit by the end of the year.

StanChart has reiterated its previous assessment that not only can the markets absorb the extra barrels by OPEC+ producers but that a deficit is likely to appear in the latter part of the current year and carry over to 2025.

Today' snapshot:

77.77 USD −0.28 (0.36%)
today
Jun 17, 12:35 AM EDT •

The last time we got down to $70 was the beginning of 2023.  $60 in April 2021.  Bottom a year earlier at $21 at the height of COVID.

I'll update periodically.  When it breaks into the $60s, we'll see how much the frackers still wanna sell.

The Saudis may be trying to do what they did to the Ruskies.  They can't flood the market anymore, but they still can under price pretty much everyone except the Ruskies or  some other Towel Heads.  If the deficit StanChart predicts doesn't turn up, they can undersell to gain market share.  It's a big version of two gas stations having a price war.  Unless the station across the street can sell at the same price, everyone will shop there.  Only if there are still buyers for the higher price gas can they keep selling.  How low can they go, for how long and keep selling?  How elastic is the demand?  How will the economy react?

I think the currency traders smell blood.  Anyone who sees recession coming is going to short oil.  Very entertaining.   ;D

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Standard-Chartered-Oil-Markets-Will-Soon-Face-Significant-Supply-Deficits.html

RE