if you were a big integrated oil company which wanted to make a load of money using your market power, you would not manipulate the price of barrel of crude. You'd use your quasi-monopolist position in the markets for refined petroleum products, which are local, fragmented and characterised by small consumers. cf Enron, which did not attempt to manipulate the world price of electricity. best dd
-----Original Message----- From: PEN-L list [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Doug Henwood Sent: 29 November 2006 19:30 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: gas prices On Nov 29, 2006, at 12:54 PM, Carrol Cox wrote: > In the last 50 years how many > price-changes of a few dollars a barrel have there been? The average of the absolute value of the yearly change in the yearly average price of oil is 22% since 1861; 27% since 1970. In other words, the price of oil is extremely volatile. Doug
