We've teetered dangerously close to oil being more than $60 a barrel.
Fears of production failure keep us from dipping below $40. Yet, fearful E&P keeps us from exceeding $60.
Phil Flynn with Price Futures Group said when prices went down earlier this year, it has hard to earn money, so now shale producers in the patch are pulling back.
“There’s many people who would believe, falsely, that oil will never go above $60 a barrel because if it does, then all the sudden shale producers are just going to flood the market with oil and keep the prices down,” said Flynn.
“Rising oil prices are not always a bad thing. People have to realize that sometimes when oil prices go up it’s a good thing. It really is reflecting a better economy. It’s reflects more people have jobs,” said Flynn.
While oil shale supply is easy to manipulate, U.S. shale makes up only five-percent of global supply. It might take something like an unexpected outage overseas to invest locally.
Should we get to $60 a barrel, keeping it there is another issue.