Donald Trump’s own goal

Financial markets

I don’t know, but if I had to guess, it really would have helped the stock market if Donald Trump had responded appropriately to the coronavirus epidemic/pandemic rather than minimizing it and fretting about how it was affecting the stock market.[1] As it stands, the market came rather near to bear market territory,[2] and the writing on the wall seems to be that those poor beleaguered capitalists will soon be in a bear market.

Paul Vigna, Avantika Chilkoti, and David Winning, “Stocks Fall More Than 7% in Dow’s Worst Day Since 2008,” Wall Street Journal, March 9, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/asian-stock-markets-in-early-monday-sell-off-after-saudi-arabias-decision-to-cut-most-of-its-oil-prices-11583713399


  1. [1]Dana Milbank, “For Trump, a reckoning has come,” Washington Post, February 28, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/02/28/trump-reckoning-has-come/; Ashley Parker, Yasmeen Abutaleb, and Lena H. Sun, “Squandered time: How the Trump administration lost control of the coronavirus crisis,” Washington Post, March 7, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-coronavirus-response-squandered-time/2020/03/07/5c47d3d0-5fcb-11ea-9055-5fa12981bbbf_story.html; Paul Waldman, “How coronavirus has deeply flummoxed conservative media,” Washington Post, February 28, 2020, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/02/28/how-coronavirus-has-deeply-flummuxed-conservative-media/
  2. [2]Paul Vigna, Avantika Chilkoti, and David Winning, “Stocks Fall More Than 7% in Dow’s Worst Day Since 2008,” Wall Street Journal, March 9, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/asian-stock-markets-in-early-monday-sell-off-after-saudi-arabias-decision-to-cut-most-of-its-oil-prices-11583713399

Reports of OPEC’s demise have been heard before

Oil

I’m pretty sure I’ve heard predictions of the demise of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) before. Spencer Jakab’s forecast[1] is interesting, but like any forecast, faces the test of time.

Of course, one has to think of climate when one thinks of anything that might affect oil extraction. Jakab sees the industry being impacted by reduced demand—prompted by the coronavirus scare, a presumably temporary factor—forcing high cost producers into bankruptcy and depriving some OPEC countries of badly needed revenue.[2] I think we have to see how that plays out, in combination with other technological developments, such as improvements in battery technology,[3] long before we can see any move to “leav[ing] it in the ground.” Jakab concludes, “Shale isn’t gone for good. OPEC’s power may be.”[4]

Spencer Jakab, “OPEC, R.I.P.,” Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/opec-r-i-p-11583722267


  1. [1]Spencer Jakab, “OPEC, R.I.P.,” Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/opec-r-i-p-11583722267
  2. [2]Spencer Jakab, “OPEC, R.I.P.,” Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/opec-r-i-p-11583722267
  3. [3]Peter Valdes-Dapena, “GM’s new electric car battery tops Tesla’s,” CNN, March 5, 2020, https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/04/business/gm-electric-car-battery-400-miles-of-range/index.html
  4. [4]Spencer Jakab, “OPEC, R.I.P.,” Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2020, https://www.wsj.com/articles/opec-r-i-p-11583722267