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LONDON — Oil prices hit 11-year lows in Asia and Europe on Monday, as a glut of crude on world markets and the recent global climate accord continue to depress fossil-fuel prices.

Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, settled at $36.51 a barrel on Monday in Europe.

Analysts say there is little to restrain continued price declines in the near term. Prices are down about 15 percent so far in December, after an OPEC meeting failed to produce measures to restrain record-high production. That meeting was quickly followed by the United Nations climate accord in Paris, which aims to reduce the world’s reliance on oil and other carbon-emitting fuels.

The latest factor weighing on prices has been unusually warm weather in the United States and Europe, which is reducing winter demand for heating oil and leading to rising stockpiles of oil products. The expectation that the American government may soon lift a decades-old ban on exports of crude from the United States may also be affecting prices.

“We are probably going to see the weakness run at least through January,” said Richard Mallinson, an analyst at Energy Aspects, a London-based market research firm.

Analysts say that crude oil prices are likely to remain under pressure in the spring, when refineries typically shut down for maintenance, weakening demand.

While few analysts had expected OPEC to decide to cut production when the group met in Vienna this month, the signals from the meeting appeared to show that the cartel, which accounts for about 30 percent of world oil production, was not even close to coming up with a plan to try to manage the market.

“Even compared to the low expectations, the meeting sent out negative signals,” Mr. Mallinson said. “There was no unity and nothing that looked like the basis for more coherence next year.”

While disgruntled OPEC members like Venezuela muttered about the “catastrophe” caused by rock-bottom oil revenues, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and other gulf countries are expected to continue to produce at or near record levels, and new supplies are expected from Iran, assuming international sanctions are lifted next year

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/22/business/energy-environment/oil-prices-opec.html?ref=world

Goldman Sachs predicted a price of $20 in 2016.

In my view, prognostic symptoms of a new world economy crisis starting in 2016.

Yes, it's really stunning when you think about it that one BTC is worth more than 11 barrels of oil. Hey, I'm a longtime BTC supporter, but I think oil should be more valuable. It's just more useful, and you don't even need the Internet to use it.

Well, price of goods is often not about usefulness or something being more valuable. Look at art, is this more helpful for people? And some pieces are insanely expensive, same with antics etc.
If bitcoin is valued more than oil it is only because people think it is worth it.

Honestly, I don't think that $20 is possible (perhaps with the exception for a short-term, such as a few hours). If such levels are reached, then most of the oil companies will be bankrupt, and the production will be stopped. What will happen if the crude oil production stops? The prices will jump back to the $100 per barrel levels!

i always take predictions that come from goldman sachs with a grain of salt. $20 is insanely low. i think it will fall a bit further, but not below $30. that's where it will bounce back. at least, that's what i think.

AFAIK, the cost of oil extraction is about $8 for OPEC countries, so it wont be a big dream $20 price level. The FED interest rate will increase the dollar value against developing countries currencies. So, even if the oil price decreases in terms of dollar, it wont change too much becasue of overvalued dollar. 

And also I believe one of the reasons for this price decrease is racing out of the shale gas producers.

That's pretty subjective. For someone with an electric car oil is pretty useless, and Bitcoin is way more useful, and the trend is we will see less and less oil usage because oil kills the environment, we will use electric cars instead. Bitcoin is clean and we will see more and more usage as oil deprecates.

oil price is going down but in Nepal its price is doubled in blackmarket due to indian blockade from past 4+ months without reason.
Seems to be quite unrelated to this thread but that is the proof which show how bigger country are dominating economics of small developing countries.

I also can't find the reason behind this massive downtrend on oil price and i don't think this would affect bitcoin price alot.

Both the shale oil operators and other high cost producers will be affected. Most notably, the UK North Sea oil producers.

their is a reason for india blockade as the nepal government started to take help from china and helping him against india, then what you think india will just sit and see. the recent government is not accepting it, so for that the nepal public is affected.

their will be reason for all and the reson for downtrend is the actuall price of oil is way to small so this price is also good for them, and one of the user told correct that, even the oil price is going down same time they are increasing the value of dollar in other countrys so it is just adjusted for other countrys so no big effect .

In Asian Pakistan, India, Nepal and other countries are facing the so many Economical problems because of Oil importing from the Arabian countries with heavy taxes by government.Its a main cause for price of oil in asia

American shale oil, OPEC inability plus uncompromising plus Saudi Arabia plus the expected return of Iran to the market give unpredictable results. Abnormally warm winter this year adds its part. Bloomberg even wrote about part of the futures for $ 15 for next year.

I'm very familiar with electric cars, and they're probably the future but those already on the market do not answer the needs of the average driver. Electric cars are nice if you live in London and don't drive much, but if you drive a lot cross-country the way I do, an electric car couldn't do it.

Uhhh, I'm glad it's not more valuable, though I agree it's more useful than bitcoin.  Much of what we buy is dependent on the price of oil--remember when it was $150/barrel a few years ago?  Gas prices in the US were over $4/gallon and it was even worse in other countries.  I'm very happy with low-priced oil, thanks.

I don't think that's gonna last forever, there are some important geopolitical games behind the lowering of oil's price, the same games could make it skyrocket

This and the ending iranian oil sanction.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2241rank.html

Average crude oil production cost is around or less then 15$/barrel.

It is estimated that iran will double its production in the short term after the lifting of the sanctions.

20-30 is very possible :)

Yes. Is wonderful to see that the Bitcoin price is this high compared to oil. But I want to see the price of Bitcoin reach $1,000.

Your target of $1000 will be reached in the middle of next year. The rise is mainly due to block halving.

Next year will be fun. I've seen some really bullish predictions coming from mainstream media as well, in retuers I saw news of a 4,700 dollar surge in 2016, good times to be a holder.

USA ban for oil export has been  removed.But in my opinion it is the end  of industrial era and begining of technology era.There is no new economic tigers also
Why oil price has to be 80$,i think 35$it is enough

There is a conflict between Sunni and Shia Muslin (Saudi vs. Iran). The oil price jumped several dollars. It might rise further.

The oil has dropped below $30 recently. It will drop further when the Iran oil flush the market. Bitcoin is a safe heaven now.

I agree about oil price drop. I see high volatility in BTC yet  ::)

Iran is pumping real hard with their oil. I think at some point we might even see the oil price fall to possibly $20!! Supply is extremely high while the demand is just at normal levels. It's good for the normal people since 1 liter of petrol here "just" costs €1.30 right now.

Still the petrol/diesel price is too damn high considering the actual price of oil and the same goes for energy, public transportations and so on.
My question is why they don't level with the new oil price? That's something that worries me, it seems like "big" players are expecting something before deciding to level other prices as well.

In Italy Oil price wheiht only about 28% of diesel Price. Other are Taxes and little profit for reseller  >:(

Tax and greed for profit.
These days i saw 30 cent price differece for the same brand of gasoline at two different gasoline stations.
To be precise it was a aral and a bft station.

Wow, in italy you are luky if find 1 cent of difference between 2 companies  ;D

That is the same in many countries. So when the oil price dropped 70%, the pump price just drop 25%. The government takes most of the money.

Actually, this is good thinking from the part of the governments. If they reduce the price of gasoline by a large margin, then the consumption will spiral out of control. This will result in increasing demand for crude oil, thereby propelling the crude price to the 2014-levels. By keeping the gasoline prices stable, the governments will be able to reduce the revenue deficit, and keep the crude oil price in the $30-$40 range for the long term.

Iran's sanctions are lifted, they also going to put tons of oil on the alrdy flooded market.

Expect even more lower prices for a some time untill..SA breaks ore Russia gets angry.

I think low price damage Russia  ::)

OPEC wants to monopolize the oil market by driving its price to a record low. They want to bankrupt oil fracking industries who need $70 a barrel to survive compared to them which only need $6 a barrel.

The low oil price will damage the American enemies. Most of them are not democratic nations. The only beneficiary is the US and Western Europe.

This volatility had nothing to do with the oil price. It was the result of Mike Hearns statement and the Cryptsy closing.

Low oil price can have some positive effects in car drivers monthly expenses at gas station, so I think this is very positive  ;)

The oil price is below $50 for some time. There is no large scale fracking industry bankruptcy. What is the real cost for franking?

But this release of ban has made the supply of oil to various countries surplus. But in many countries even after this the Tax or price has not being cut down. It doesn't mean the dawn of technological era just because of this ban release. Its just a start of economy growth for few countries, because of this ban release few middle east countries are facing recession.

My only real fear (besides the usual economic indicator crap) is that it halts the progress of alternative energies. I for one am excited for electrics to take over anything that runs on gas or diesel fuel.

I think oil will rebound a little,but oil will loose  his mportance with  time
it is the end of some period in human history,everything has his end and new  begining

If this means that there will be a bigger move to electric then this is good IMO. Too many technologies powered by electricity have come and gone with no support and some downright killed. Maybe this is a changing of the times. 

This whole oil thing is becoming a huge crisis. I still don't even understand why the price of oil is this low. Anyone care to explain?

It is supply and demand. There were over invertments in the last few years, too much oil is being produced. So the price drops.

You cannot keep 100x profit margins for long, be lucky if you can produce a 1.5x profit margin these days. This was just a market correction that they had it coming for almost a century.

Free market is about free price discovery, not about rigging the oil market via the oil cartel, nor about printed money pumping up the prices.

The profit margins are insanely high for some of the producers (such as Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq and Iran). For this group, the cost of production is around $10 to $15 per barrel. Anything above that is profit. But for the high-cost producers such as Venezuela, Brazil, Norway and the United Kingdom, the cost of production ranges from $25 to $60 per barrel. So right now many of them are producing crude at a net loss.

While it slumps to 11 year lows in Asia and Europe, the prices of both Petrol and Diesel has increased by 20% in the Middle East due to the Saudi Arabia and Iran crisis. It's increased after such a long time, and it's kind of scary seeing the oil prices increase in oil rich countries. Along with this they've also decided to impose VAT and other taxes on the expatriates.

Well it still not a good news for my country. Although Oil's price has decreased, my local oil company ( pertamina ) doesn't want to decrease our fuel price because they still want to cover their loss before Oil's value changed.
But still we hope that our goverment decrease as soon as possible because life got tough but we won't tougher

I agree that it may be the end of a period in human history.  A bloody oil period that can give way to other technologies that may not start so many wars. Good riddance. 

Market equilibrium

Thats one of the most important concepts of economics. The market will find the mean always if left untouched.

Even with the oil cartels you cannot keep the price too high, and the more you interfere in the market, the worse the crash will be.

Demand for oil probably dropped 20 years ago, but the price didnt reflected it due to cheap money.


Folks the normal profit margin is about +50% <> +100% profit margin at best , and I think the price will remain in that range, unless they start printing again.

so confused with oil price this year after slide down, today price slide up a little but other fiat currency is coming strong is different like before after oil price down other fiat currency is coming down like US dollar,euro,yuan,Etc.

If these expatriates can be paid with bitcoin, they can avoid those taxes. So bitcoin could be popular choice there.

i think that it might be a huge investment possibility right now because of that though im afraid that it might drop even more

thats sad, though i think it might be a good opportunity to buy it

This price falling oil gets continued, just due to the surplus availability of oil from the oil wealth countries.
The oil market is with huge stock than the demand so coming days does't hope for increase in price of oil
It can be a investment time for alternative technology

The market correction is happening but I am optimistic enough to ponder entry into some oil stocks.
China may be recorrecting but the market has taken enough of a hit that it has some bounce from this range once the supply glut is eaten, remembering 2008 a supply glut can very quickly become a demand glut once enough production is impacted.

Right now its a time for consolidations and the ones that emerge will be the key players for the next oil rally, a structrual change to oil is still unlikely the efficiency we see in alternate energies is still not there and coal is still dirtier so LNG and Nat gas still remain the options for clean energy of the near future.

It might take a year for the market to consume all the surplus oil. Saudi will keep pumping oil until it kills Iran.

I read recently that the oil price could go as low as $16 a barrel, at that price i am sure alot of companies would go under and governments would be on the brink

Iran is not a big threat to them, IMO saudis are pumping more and more to kill the fracking industry (which gave the Oil production in US a big boost) and to bother Russia which is more and more present in their region.
Saudis can only count on Oil to survive, so they are under a lot of pressure right now (just look at their government finances).

When the price go below $16 and stay there over 6 months, many countries will go under, not just many companies. Many banks will also be in trouble.

Ah!

If that was not so vulgar I would spit on this post.
Market equilibrium... Yeah sure...
It's like "the invisible hand" or "the great chain".
It odesn't exist and it's a wrong concept.
Simply because some companies and some people share most of power, money and knowledge.

There is a hand, but it's linked to very existing people...

Is it cheaper to mine bitcoin now? Oil prices dropped but the electricity cost has not changed!

When oil price drops, we were told that electricity is generated from natural gas/coal; when the oil price increase, we were told this directly affect the cost of electricity.

That is unfortunately how it works. When price drops it always takes longer for the prices to correct to reflect this. This is also because the companies buy in at the higher prices in bulk and is than an effect of undercutting each other, not because they are so nice to reflect their cheaper source in the consumer price.

The energy companies buy the electricity with future a few months/years in advance. So they cannot sell at the current price.

Yes they can. Some companies build dams so they can sell energy when there is peaks in demand (such as midday) and buy when demand is low (mostly nuclear power at night).

Can't tell you, I'm French. French electricity is cheap because it comes from nuclear power ;D

How much do you pay per kWh. Is that still over $0.15 per kWh. If it is so, there is not profit to be made for mining.

you don't need to have over 0.15 to have no profit, even at above 0.05 there is no real profit already, diff is skyrocketing pretty fast

Wow! Nobody mines in France I think. It's around 0.14 so not really usefull. But it's still rather cheap for Europe as far as I know ;D

bitcoin mining is a tough job and has to be done with complete planning because sometimes you will end up spending more on electricity than profit by this way we lose our time and profit and end up as a loser.

Yes, oil prices are very low from some time ago, for car drivers this is very good news .  :D I think low oil price can make some headache to large oil sale companies.  ;)

Overproduction is not good, If something renewable perhaps but oil is not. Low prices should lead to overproduction.

It is not just oil companies, there are entire countries dependent on oil.
Not to mention the millions of people who have invested in oil companies.
But on the whole, I would say more people benefit from lower oil prices than higher oil prices.

That's true, Commodities such as Oil control a very large % of Global Economy and such dumps in its price are going to let some Super-Powers suffer for sure...

Low prices will not lead to over-production.

If the prices are low, then the profit margins will be reduced. So for the companies, there is less incentive to ramp up their production. Therefore the exact opposite is going to happen. In case of prices staying low, the production will decline in the long-term. (Already the Bakken shale oil production in North Dakota is showing signs of decrease).

For the Western companies, when the price is low, it will produce less or shutdown. For Iran or Saudi, if they want to balance their budget, they have to produce more.

As long as the price is more than the marginal cost of production, companies will keep producing.
However, investments in fresh capacity will stop.

OK,

But If I remember correctly the prices were down due to OPEC countries increased the production. Then if supply increases and the demand stays the same then prices fall as on this case however with the low prices I guess that some countries try to get oil as much as they can and this should lead to an increase in demand and therefore in the production of those who are selling cheap. I'll make a search on the production since the fall to see that meeting.

After do a little search I found the next:

-OPEC controls about 43% of world oil production and 81% of stocks domain oil. Its oil exports stood at about 51%.
-While production has surged in recent years  supply has increased more than demand recently however the cause by which has fallen more than 70 percent since June 2014.
-The  increase come from Saudi Arabia,Iraq,Iran mainly.

So 3 are members of the OPEC, but even so,  maybe more than just new oil supplies from the Middle East influencing the market. Example:

World field production of crude oil in September was up 1.5 million barrels x day over the previous year. More than all of that came from a  increase in the U.S. Saudi Arabia, and  Iraq. If it had not been for the increased oil production from these three countries, world oil production would actually have been down over the last year.

Now come the thing interesting Im agree with you that: If the prices are low, then the profit margins will be reduced. So for the companies, there is less incentive to ramp up their production. Therefore the exact opposite is going to happen. In case of prices staying low, the production will decline in the long-term. (Already the Bakken shale oil production in North Dakota is showing signs of decrease).

Taking this in  consideration I could are agree with you that the production will decline in the long-term
especially in the countries that have lost due to the high cost of extraction, But no evidence that countries overproducers  decreases its production  as they do not decide bringing about the fall in prices as has been the case until now since June 2014.  Now as you say  North Dakota is showing signs of decrease we can say that US is showing a decrease but anyway,  Why increased  production September on? this was done together with Saudi Arabia, and  Iraq. If they had done world oil production would actually have been down almost over the last year which is contradictory.

Now my statement:  Low prices should lead to overproduction. Agree, is not true at all as you pointed clearly. However for instance one can not completely rule out that such, Suppose for example a company has a debt and has payments to make then necessarily has to sell it product at a low price but now it needed  to produce more to get the same amount of revenue which means an overproduction, despite the decrease in production is offset one another overproduction.

Finally please let me show a graphic where Supply has increased more than demand recently:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/business/energy-environment/oil-price-supply-demand-imblance.html

The situation is not that simple. All the OPEC members have well defined quotas, which they are expected to maintain. However, recently, Saudi Arabia started producing crude oil well over their quota limits. This was what triggered the oil price crash in 2015, from $110 per barrel to less than $30 per barrel. As far as I know, the other OPEC members are honoring their quota limits.

Four oil producing nations including Saudi Arab, Russia agreed to maintain the current production levels. The price will not drop soon.

Bummer, I'm hoping for a downward trend as a consumer. But I guess major decline in price have some major effect in the industry so anything that is too much is bad and it applies here as well.

Bah it won't be so low for long. You can't do anything against that, it's a supply demand market with limited supply and growing demand.

No this time the situation is not as previous, in which there will be a price rise after reduction. Now the market has surplus availability than demand which will continue which makes price low for long run.

If the output is kept at present levels, the oil supply will still exceed the demand. The price will continue to go down.

they are planning to stock the oil to sell when the price rises,they have already had contracts with india to store oil

There is almost to storage capacity now. The oil tanks are full of oils now. So the oil has to be dumped to the market.

There is a storage cost as well as opportunity cost associated with stocking oil. It might be cheaper to not produce (i.e. do not extract - store crude in oil wells). So it might make sense to sell now, even if the price of oil is expected to increase.

the problem of oil price is there are some countries which their economy is depending completely on selling their oil. and even when prices continues falling, they will not stop producing and the market will not rise again. it is time to make more researches on the renewal power as oil mining may cost more than its value in the next few years

It means that there are some oil traders, which trade a lot of oil in the market.  ;)

Is it cheaper to mine bitcoin now? Oil prices dropped but the electricity cost has not changed!

When oil price drops, we were told that electricity is generated from natural gas/coal; when the oil price increase, we were told this directly affect the cost of electricity.