Obama has been getting some criticism from all sides for supporting, read "initiating", the International Energy Agency's decision to release 2 million barrels of petroleum for use from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. The reason, ostensibly, was to make up for the decline of oil from Libya as a result of the non-war.
Libya ships 1.6 million barrels of oil a day, mostly to Europe. The total shipments a day in the world are 87 million barrels. 31 billion barrels a year. Despite the small amount released by the SPR, the price of oil dropped 10%, 25% in Brent Crude. This high response is said to be caused by the cost of oil at the margin, when it it delivered. Speculators, thinking that oil will continue to rise, buy oil and if they are fearful that governments might dump oil on the markets unsuspected, they buy more cautiously. The price drops.
The world's total GDP is 60 trillion dollars a year. 3 trillion goes for oil. A drop in 10% of the cost of oil is 300 billion dollars now available for something else. 20% is 600 billion dollars. Does that remind you of anything? That is the amount in Bernanke's QE2 that is about to expire.
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