Bitcoin Forum

I had an observation I wanted to share.  notice the drop of USD/BTC and the drop USD/Barrel of Oil.

I did a very crude analysis using monthly average prices  USD/ Barrel; USD/BTC then calculated the BTC/Barrel.  Recently It looks like oil is backing the value of BTC.  Even though the $$/Barrel is dropping, the buying power of BTC is constant when purchasing oil.  It sure seems like a coincidence but someone told me things never happen by coincidence. That is almost 12 months the value BTC/Barrel has remained fairly constant.  Looks like it started around February 2013  (before then BTC/Barrel is OFF the chart)

Maybe China is buying Oil from Iran with BTC??  Or maybe someone in the USA is doing that and importing the oil from a different port??  

https://i.imgur.com/LVwmeos.png
[edit: the dates on the chart were originally messed up]

Here is the data, some of the last months usd/btc average price was a quick estimate,

Date   USD/Barrel   USD/BTC   BTC/Barrel
August 2013   108.16   105.80   1.02
Sept. 30, 2013    108.76   124.33   0.87
October 2013   105.43   156.50   0.67
November 2013   102.63   517.00   0.20
December 2013   105.48   799.00   0.13
January 2014   102.10   818.00   0.12
February 2014   104.83   659.00   0.16
March 2014   104.04   594.00   0.18
April 2014   104.87   461.00   0.23
May 2014   105.71   486.00   0.22
June 2014   108.37   615.00   0.18
July 2014   105.23   615.00   0.17
August 2014   100.05   535.00   0.19
Sept. 30, 2014    95.85   375.00   0.26
October 2014   86.08   345.00   0.25
November 2014   76.99   375.00   0.21
December 2014   60.70   290.00   0.21

Or maybe I am over analyzing it.  Oil is a value of energy, it takes energy to generate bitcoin.

It is really fresh idea about the correlation between oil and bitcoin. It needs more wide time span to verify your theory.

There is a website called dubious correlations, I think this belongs there.
I don't see global oil production or usage bring linked to the bitcoin price at all!

the only relationship is they both are making me lose money lol  :'(


This forum is full of irrelevant correlations. 

I'm in the "there's no evidence for this" camp. And logically, I just don't see a basis for it in reality. What is bitcoin's market cap again? Like $5 billion? LOL.... ;D

i never knew you could buy oil with bitcoin hehe

No its just that both of them are falling at the same pace since they are both the same volatility as commodities. This means that they are falling the same % against USD therefore being stable with each other price % ratio wise.

You all are right this does not prove anything.  correlation between these two prior to Feb 2014 was non existant.  now for 12 months they look tied to each other.  the chances of that happening randomly "seems" low. 

If the same correlation holds true to btc/gold, btc/steel  btc/copper  btc/OJ  btc/pork bellies then I would say there is nothing to the correlation.  Anyone want to do that research?

some sites show oversea oil tanker holds 340,000 barrels of oil.  Today that costs 68,000 btc.  I dont think we have ever had one day transaction volume that high.

EDIT: on blockchain.info top 100 largest transactions of last 50,000 transactions are between 466,000 to 500,000 btc.  so that is worth several tankers in one transaction.

Your missing the point. No one is trading Oil for BTC however any currency/asset can be paired to any currency/asset no matter the liquidity. Its just that Oil/BTC is unpopular therefore there is no tradeable pair for this but a pair can be made for any relative currency.

Interesting. . . 

I am not sure what point you think I am missing?  my op I said I had an observation I wanted to share: it was btc/barrel has been constant for 12 months.  I dont think we would find the same correlation with other commodities for as long a period, but I have not done the analysis.  It is pure speculation what is causing that correlation.  I never said I knew, definately never said I "knew for sure".  I am also aware you can compare anything to anything.  I just thought it was interesting - thats all.  I guess your point is that you did not find it interesting?  thats ok, I got that point.

I do not know of any trading exchange that lets you trade oil for btc, Sorry but I never meant to imply that. 

I was saying MAYBE someone was actually buying oil with btc.  You have heard of sanctions haven't you? 
I am not sure that anyone can know for sure what btc is being traded for?  If so, how?

How do you know for sure that there is no one paying someone btc for oil?  And I never said "for sure" just maybe.

If you know that for sure, maybe you can help answer what these transactions were spent/traded for?:
500,000 btc?
https://blockchain.info/largest-recent-transactions

One oil tanker would cost 68,000 btc, recent daily volume is 286,000 btc so could be possible.  If so, I am guessing they are breaking payment down into smaller transactions.

Also, I never said Oil production was tied to btc, but speculating about someone doing business with countries that there are sanctions against.

Imagine if someone was selling a couple tankers each week in BTC, and IF they agreed a year ago that they would buy at 0.2 btc/barrel, then that btc trade volume would strongly influence the USD/BTC price.

Oil buyer send usd to broker
broker buys btc for usd
broker sends btc to sanctioned oil producer
oil producer then sells btc for other currency

repeat

for the record, I dont think this is REALLY going on but only that it could be thats all

It's pretty interesting, I can't make sense out of it tho.
The question here is: Has oil hit botton yet? Im not sure I want to buy any yet.

Nice analyzing but still need time for this theory

I would just throw the theory in the trash. On its face, there is no basis for this. The fact that they are both down huge over the past year doesn't mean that they are correlated.

Quite an interesting analysis. Technically it is possible because it's quite rare to find a correlation that stays on to maintain at a range for so long. Let's see if this still stays

The amount of money exchanged for oil is far higher that the volume of btc. Also, as an Iranian, no BTC exchange exists here.

obviously people selling their bitcoin to buy Oil
the Oil's price are very low now

Lots of things happen due to "coincidence", in fact coincidence is merely the human nature of trying to associate connections to things that aren't connected.

I do, however, think this is an interesting thing to analyze further. Can you compare the price of BTC/USD and the price of oil back 3 years and track it going forward? That's the only way to see if a trend is emerging, and know that even if a trend emerges it DOESN'T mean that there is a causal relationship.

I look forward to seeing more analysis you're able to put together and share.

"People" don't buy barrels of crude oil. Large companies buy oil to refine into  motor oil or gasoline or diesel.

Prior to Feb 2014 there is nowhere near any correlation, USD/BTC was off the chart, and in 2013/2012 btc was around $1.  Obviously BTC was not created to do this, but when the value and transaction volume became large enough ($1100/BTC in Dec 2013), MAYBE someone/somegroup decided to use btc to try to get around some sanctions.  (this does not represent global oil production just a couple tankers a week)

I dont have my original data anymore, I never even saved the file.  But with data prior to Feb 2014 it was hard to see the correlation last 12 months  (It was like 0.01 BTC/barrel at some points and that value moved up and down drastically making no logical sense)  You make a good point Possum, if some could see the graph with prior year data with absolutely no correlation with BTC/barrel ratio all over the universe, then all of a sudden it remains constant, not for a week, or a month, but for an entire year, you have to say hmmm.

Considering how strict China is, I cannot see them using BTC to buy oil. But I like the chart, and if it went back more than a year I think it would be plausible and considering that it is a process to buy coins. I cant see them, buying bitcoins just to buy oil seems pointless to me, because they could just use cash.

The price of a single bitcoin is arbitrary so it has no causal link to what you pay for a barrel of oil.

All this shows is that they are both going down since a year ago.

This is right. The dollar has been overall strong as of the last several months because it is speculated that the federal reserve will start rising short term interest rates to more normal levels.

In addition to the dollar and oil that the dollar has strengthened against, it has strengthened against most foreign currencies, especially emerging markets

lol

You can prob trade crude on 1Broker or on some other future platform. That includes barrels!

http://www.tylervigen.com/

Yup it belongs there.