Articles by Michael Moynihan

The oil companies should bail out the automakers

Cross-posted at the NDN blog —– As the U.S. auto companies frantically search for ways to stave off bankruptcy, an interesting bit of news surfaced yesterday: Exxon Mobil’s profit in the last quarter was the highest of any company ever in history: $14.83 billion. The company is on track to make $50 billion or so […]

Investing in clean infrastructure

Originally posted to the NDN blog. —– The debate now underway in the Congress on a financial bailout is not the only important piece of business before the Congress in its waning days. With a real economic recession now all but certain, Congress is considering a second stimulus package. But at this critical moment in […]

Oil wealth contains the ‘seeds of its own destruction’

Originally posted to the NDN blog. The reappearance of a belligerent Russia on the world stage, buoyed by high oil prices and newfound wealth, would appear to signal a new era in global politics. For anyone still clinging to the idea of the unipolar moment, the spectacle of Nicholas Sarkozy brokering a deal between Russia […]

Increasing oil production will not substitute as energy solution

Originally posted on the NDN Blog.

Yesterday, Saudi Arabia did what everyone -- including George W. Bush on bended knee -- has been asking it to do for months: agree to increase production. Prices closed up a dollar. The Saudi move and its non-impact on the market shows just how tight supplies remain. While it was designed in large part to offset declines in Nigerian production due to rebel violence in the oil-rich, poverty-stricken Niger Delta, it might have sent a psychological signal of easing supplies but it did not.

Meanwhile, back in Washington, another panel of oil traders told Chair Dingell's House Energy and Commerce Oversight subcommittee that speculation is driving up oil prices and tighter oversight of commodities futures markets could lower prices. Staffers released data to the effect that 70 percent of trades are now speculative, up from 30 percent not long ago.