Oil
Executive Summary
- Japan is intentionally devaluing its currency through money printing. The recent boost in the Nikkei is simply the result of this flood of new money.
- Japan industry is now experiencing cost increases on two fronts: inflation of the money supply, and rising prices on the global market for commodities.
- Rising bond rates are all but guaranteed.
- Gold vs. the yen is surging and will pick up momentum from here
- The ten predictable events that will happen next, as the unavoidable Japan disaster unfolds
If you have not yet read Part I: The Arrival of Japan's Sunset available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.
In Part II we explain why Japan has unequivocally entered the terminal phase of its 20-year reflationary experiment.
Further “abundance” harvesting from this point forward will be difficult if not impossible.
Is the devaluation of the yen really the successful technology that will fool nature? We think not. The outcome will have spectacular implications for many global assets, ranging from real estate, to stock markets, to oil and gold.
Observers of Japan from this point forward should be sober about the threshold the country has now crossed. Japan has effectively said to the world: Go ahead, make my day. Sell our currency, give us inflation, and get out of our bonds.
Japan has indeed taken to heart the Krugman dictum, and committed to irresponsibility.
The 10 Next Predictable Steps to Japan’s Unfolding Disaster
PREVIEW by Gregor MacdonaldExecutive Summary
- Japan is intentionally devaluing its currency through money printing. The recent boost in the Nikkei is simply the result of this flood of new money.
- Japan industry is now experiencing cost increases on two fronts: inflation of the money supply, and rising prices on the global market for commodities.
- Rising bond rates are all but guaranteed.
- Gold vs. the yen is surging and will pick up momentum from here
- The ten predictable events that will happen next, as the unavoidable Japan disaster unfolds
If you have not yet read Part I: The Arrival of Japan's Sunset available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.
In Part II we explain why Japan has unequivocally entered the terminal phase of its 20-year reflationary experiment.
Further “abundance” harvesting from this point forward will be difficult if not impossible.
Is the devaluation of the yen really the successful technology that will fool nature? We think not. The outcome will have spectacular implications for many global assets, ranging from real estate, to stock markets, to oil and gold.
Observers of Japan from this point forward should be sober about the threshold the country has now crossed. Japan has effectively said to the world: Go ahead, make my day. Sell our currency, give us inflation, and get out of our bonds.
Japan has indeed taken to heart the Krugman dictum, and committed to irresponsibility.
In this week's Off the Cuff podcast, Chris and Adam discuss:
- A classic symptom of Peak Oil
- The 4 largest oil majors report production declines for 2012
- Rampant insider selling
- The selling-to-buying ratio is at an abnormally high 9-to-1
- Gold's flight to China
- The West-to-East bullion transfer accelerates
- Scarce platinum
- Mine shutdowns and growing demand sends prices higher
- The upcoming Peak Prosperity Seminar at Rowe, MA
- Now's the time for those interested to register
Off the Cuff: Disturbing Data
PREVIEW by Chris MartensonIn this week's Off the Cuff podcast, Chris and Adam discuss:
- A classic symptom of Peak Oil
- The 4 largest oil majors report production declines for 2012
- Rampant insider selling
- The selling-to-buying ratio is at an abnormally high 9-to-1
- Gold's flight to China
- The West-to-East bullion transfer accelerates
- Scarce platinum
- Mine shutdowns and growing demand sends prices higher
- The upcoming Peak Prosperity Seminar at Rowe, MA
- Now's the time for those interested to register
On the heels of Chris' recent report clarifying the global net energy predicament, he and PeakProsperity.com contributing editor Gregor Macdonald sit down to talk in depth about the broken relationship between energy costs and economic growth.
For much of the twentieth century, the developed world saw a steady march upwards in wages and living standards, due primarily to huge quantities of cheap, high-yielding liquid hydrocarbon. As we find ourselves bumping along the plateau of Peak Oil's apex, suddenly we find "growth" is a lot harder to come by.
Gregor Macdonald: What the End of Cheap Oil Means
by Chris MartensonOn the heels of Chris' recent report clarifying the global net energy predicament, he and PeakProsperity.com contributing editor Gregor Macdonald sit down to talk in depth about the broken relationship between energy costs and economic growth.
For much of the twentieth century, the developed world saw a steady march upwards in wages and living standards, due primarily to huge quantities of cheap, high-yielding liquid hydrocarbon. As we find ourselves bumping along the plateau of Peak Oil's apex, suddenly we find "growth" is a lot harder to come by.
Executive Summary
- Petroleum is bumping along its global maximum plateau
- Global demand (led by Asia) will soon far outstrip supply
- Why oil is getting scarcer, but cheap oil is already non-existent
- How insufficient net energy will be the mortal pin that pops our unsustainable financial system
If you have not yet read The Really, Really Big Picture, available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.
Global Supply
Where the U.S. shale plays have been getting an undue allotment of press compared to their current and projected flow rates, the major story remains that oil companies are spending more and more as oil becomes more difficult to find and challenging to produce.
What's interesting is that so many people hold the opposite view, perhaps shaped by the breathless manner in which new finds are announced, but rarely with an appropriate level of context or caution so that we can judge how significant or likely these finds actually are.
Here's a relatively recent example that captures this dynamic rather well. Back in 2010, a very exciting discovery was splashed all across the news with some very heady claims:
McMoRan Exploration announced a potentially major natural gas discovery in its operated Davy Jones ultra-deep prospect drilled in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico (commonly referred to as the "shelf"), just 10 miles off the Louisiana coast.
Positive drilling results could be a huge boom for the company. McMoRan Exploration had proved oil and gas reserves at year-end 2009 totaling 271.9 Bcfe (billion cubic feet of natural gas equivalents), compared with 344.8 Bcfe in 2008.
Estimates of the size of the discovery range from 2 trillion to 6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, rivaling the largest gas finds ever made in the Gulf.
(Source)
This is the nature of such press releases, as I now think of them. Yes, it's exciting that billions of barrels could be discovered and that these finds might produce as much as 15 billion barrels of oil. Unfortunately, a short euphoric sound bite like that is all of the story that every really gets transmitted to the casual reader. I combat these perceptions constantly in my live Q&A sessions after speeches.
The full reality is contained within the context-free but vitally important statement that tapping this field requires drilling down to more than 28,000 feet (!).
Fast forward to 2012 and here's the reality of that find…
How Energy Woes Will Trigger Financial Crisis
PREVIEW by Chris MartensonExecutive Summary
- Petroleum is bumping along its global maximum plateau
- Global demand (led by Asia) will soon far outstrip supply
- Why oil is getting scarcer, but cheap oil is already non-existent
- How insufficient net energy will be the mortal pin that pops our unsustainable financial system
If you have not yet read The Really, Really Big Picture, available free to all readers, please click here to read it first.
Global Supply
Where the U.S. shale plays have been getting an undue allotment of press compared to their current and projected flow rates, the major story remains that oil companies are spending more and more as oil becomes more difficult to find and challenging to produce.
What's interesting is that so many people hold the opposite view, perhaps shaped by the breathless manner in which new finds are announced, but rarely with an appropriate level of context or caution so that we can judge how significant or likely these finds actually are.
Here's a relatively recent example that captures this dynamic rather well. Back in 2010, a very exciting discovery was splashed all across the news with some very heady claims:
McMoRan Exploration announced a potentially major natural gas discovery in its operated Davy Jones ultra-deep prospect drilled in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico (commonly referred to as the "shelf"), just 10 miles off the Louisiana coast.
Positive drilling results could be a huge boom for the company. McMoRan Exploration had proved oil and gas reserves at year-end 2009 totaling 271.9 Bcfe (billion cubic feet of natural gas equivalents), compared with 344.8 Bcfe in 2008.
Estimates of the size of the discovery range from 2 trillion to 6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, rivaling the largest gas finds ever made in the Gulf.
(Source)
This is the nature of such press releases, as I now think of them. Yes, it's exciting that billions of barrels could be discovered and that these finds might produce as much as 15 billion barrels of oil. Unfortunately, a short euphoric sound bite like that is all of the story that every really gets transmitted to the casual reader. I combat these perceptions constantly in my live Q&A sessions after speeches.
The full reality is contained within the context-free but vitally important statement that tapping this field requires drilling down to more than 28,000 feet (!).
Fast forward to 2012 and here's the reality of that find…
[Many longtime followers of the Crash Course have asked Chris to update his forecasts for Peak Oil in light of the production increases in shale oil and gas over recent years. What started out as a modest effort at clarification morphed into a much more massive 3-report treatise as Chris sifted through mountains of new data that ultimately left him more convinced than ever we are facing a global net energy crisis – despite misguided media efforts intended to convince us otherwise. His reports are being released in series over the next several weeks; the first installment is below.]
There has been a very strong and concerted public-relations effort to spin the recent shale energy plays of the U.S. as complete game-changers for the world energy outlook. These efforts do not square up well with the data and are creating a vast misperception about the current risks and future opportunities among the general populace and energy organizations alike. The world remains quite hopelessly addicted to petroleum, and the future will be shaped by scarcity – not abundance, as some have claimed.
This series of reports will assemble the relevant data into a simple and easy-to-understand story that has the appropriate context to provide a meaningful place to begin a conversation and make decisions.
The Really, Really Big Picture
by Chris Martenson[Many longtime followers of the Crash Course have asked Chris to update his forecasts for Peak Oil in light of the production increases in shale oil and gas over recent years. What started out as a modest effort at clarification morphed into a much more massive 3-report treatise as Chris sifted through mountains of new data that ultimately left him more convinced than ever we are facing a global net energy crisis – despite misguided media efforts intended to convince us otherwise. His reports are being released in series over the next several weeks; the first installment is below.]
There has been a very strong and concerted public-relations effort to spin the recent shale energy plays of the U.S. as complete game-changers for the world energy outlook. These efforts do not square up well with the data and are creating a vast misperception about the current risks and future opportunities among the general populace and energy organizations alike. The world remains quite hopelessly addicted to petroleum, and the future will be shaped by scarcity – not abundance, as some have claimed.
This series of reports will assemble the relevant data into a simple and easy-to-understand story that has the appropriate context to provide a meaningful place to begin a conversation and make decisions.
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