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Over the past month Crude Oil prices have slowly, and quietly climbed back up near the feared $80/barrel price. Right now, crude is quoted at $77.29. Amid this rally, we have noticed that investors in oil stocks seem to be shifting their attention away from crude prices and towards market trends, and primarily earnings numbers. Below we show the year-to-date performance of the S&P 500 Integrated Oil & Gas Index, versus crude oil prices. The index is made up of: CVX, COP, XOM, HES, MRO, MUR & OXY.
In my opinion, oil related equities will be under pressure again when oil is trying to work off overbought condition or general market is under pressure again. In general market downturn, oil related equities behave more like equity than as commodity.
Posted by: gl | July 31, 2007 at 11:20 PM
Very true. Oil stocks can trade as commodities in some instances, but generally not in this type of selloff. The interesting thing is that on a day like today, when the market was up 100 and oil prices didn't do badly, energy did quite poorly.
Posted by: Aaron | August 03, 2007 at 01:15 AM