21 April 2020

The day oil died was Monday the 20th of April 2020 – for the first time in history the price of a novated futures contract CL00 for Crude Oil WTI went negative (“CLK20” ticker on the CME for May 2020). It got buried -$37.63 below ground, final resting place Cushing, Oklahoma. Speculators holding those futures and retail investors holding the ETF “USO” will have, in market parlance, been “carted out” on the day. Whilst the next roll month is still trading in positive territory (at time of writing!) the issues that caused the May contract to hit -$37.63/bbl have not gone away. These same issues may not go away by the time the June contract expires, so future oil prices may well go negative again… [read more]