Looks like something out of a text book , there is no scarcity of crude oil , there is no scarcity of gasoline , i do hate it when people call something they don't agree with socialist fallacies.-----i will repeat ---no commodity that is controlled by a cartel should be traded on our exchanges.
It's a socialist fallacy because it involves government dictating things to businesses & people which is antithetic to free markets & liberty, it's none of government's business what commodities are traded on what exchanges, unless you believe in the socialist premise that government owns everything
In a free society, people have what we call "property rights" which allow private owners full discretion over their property & same holds true for exchanges as well as those trading on them
what don't you understand about in america we use 400 million gallons of gasoline everyday , we export about 120 million gallons of gas everyday. to me this is like selling planes/arms to germany/japan during ww2.
NationalSocialismForums is right around the corner, this is ronpaulforums so you're mistaken I think
read what happened to silver in the early 80's when bunker hunt and 2 others tried to control the silver market , read what the CFTC did to him. silver went from about $50/oz to about $20/oz very fast.
They had money, they bought silver in anticipation of inflation due to US going off gold-standard (buying gold was prohibited at the time) so what? Ron Paul has been buying gold & silver since the 70s too, & I'm sure if he had the kind of money Hunts had, he would've piled up on gold & silver as well, in fact, that's what most people here are doing right now
And it was very disingenuous of comex, they played all sorts of shenanigans as people running it were short-selling silver & they'd stake in causing the prices to fall so they played all kind of tricks like, even ceasing trading, to cause silver prices to fall, after that Volker massively raised interest-rates which was the primary determinant to keep the prices of gold & silver down after that, not to mention even a lot of central-banks dumped their reserves to say to people - hey, gold, silver, etc is useless, look, how good the toilet-paper-money is - so of course, the government had to demonize Hunt to move attention away from what was actually going on with inflation, if it had continued for a while, sooner or later there would have been cries from public to go back on gold-silver standard, Ron Paul was even on Gold Commission at the time
Name me ONE commodity that is traded on our exchanges other than crude oil being under a cartel. this effects every american more than most understand , of which i feel very sorry for.
I feel sorry for people who support Ron Paul & yet oppose the very principles that he's held dear for decades
Cartels CAN'T DICTATE PRICES, supply & demand do - unless of course, it's a coercive monopoly/cartel, which is usually government-enforced - healthcare is a decent example, but in this case I suppose it's more like thieves than cartels
BUT nobody is forcing to buy oil (unlike healthcare would be

) so the more prices rise, the demand falls & they've to lower prices to make profits, it's irrelevant what prices they "want" to sell it at, they do NOT stick to their guns, they're made up of self-interested individuals who want to make profits so when prices rise they automatically produce more oil which causes supply to increase & puts downward pressure on prices
Central-planning doesn't work for same reasons, just because they're cartel doesn't mean that they cease to be self-interested individuals, no the don't; people like you who think such planned cartels can work are poster-children for the failed central-planning programs
The fact that neither cartels nor speculators control prices can be realized from the fact that oil was about $150 before the collapse & in a short while it fell to $50, where were these cartels & speculators then? Why didn't they hold the price at $150??? It's simple, the demand just fell through the floor due to weaker outlook & deflating effect
And why are they at ~$100 right now, I mean they're cartels, right? And they can charge whatever they want, right? So why $100, why not $1000? How about $10000? Million? Why aren't they doing that? How about speculators, wouldn't they make a lot of money if it went $million/barrel? So why aren't they doing it?
BECAUSE none of them dictate prices, supply & demand does! Prices are products of supply & demand! The more prices go up, the more lucrative selling becomes which increases supply & pushes prices down!
don't you understand your saying about liquidity makes no sence because 99% of the crude contracts are never delivered , its just a game , i will repeat the defin of commodity trading is----someone that does not have the product selling to someone that don't want the product , and both sides trying to make money-----
You don't understand that those 99% is what keeps liquidity, otherwise the futures market would be stale, there'd be low volumes & very little trading if only actual buyers/sellers were allowed to trade & everyone else was driven They keep the markets liquid & keep up the volumes otherwise spreads would massively increase & volumes go down & there would be wild swings in prices leading to higher costs for actual buyers/sellers
Saying speculators increase prices is like saying that X + 1 - 1 = X + 1

, obviously, it equals only X, in short, when speculators buy, yes, they temporarily put upward pressure on price but they reverse the same when they square off so the net effect is nil, & that's why only the actual buyers/sellers & information about supply & demand can move prices in the long-run
So even if you get your wish of 75% margin, that's just going to drive speculators out & there will be FEWER people willing to trade at any given time, causing low volumes & low volumes mean higher spreads & therefore higher cost of trading & all you're going to get is wild swings in prices because there are only a few people willing to trade
Not to mention, you'd be asking actual buyers & sellers to unnecessarily lock more money for long periods which they could've put to better use & thereby it's only going to end up raising cost of pretty much everything in the economy
Are you part of OWS or something? I'd recommend you the communist-clique there - there you'd find a lot of people who hate on "rich evil basterds" that make money in ways that they don't understand & that's why they think it's bad because they can't do the same, seems like you suffered some losses in the futures-market & now, blaming the "those evil hedge-funds"
I'm just curious, why are you here? This movement is about personal liberty, property-rights, free markets & free trade, all of which Ron Paul stands for & for someone with the nick "I love RP", you seem to stand for almost everything Ron Paul stands AGAINST
If you really want to learn about futures & speculation then google "price discovery" & about the history of futures markets & why speculators are an important part of it
I don't think so. What you would see is liquidity in the futures market plummet, with producers and consumers finding it increasingly difficult to risk manage or hedge. Price volatility in commodities is generally known as an increasing linear function of scarcity; scarcity being defined as the inverse of inventory. A relatively illiquid futures market increases price volatility which wreaks havoc on inventory management. Futures markets for commodities play a very important and positive role in a free market especially in the realms of price discovery and price stability.
You would not see crude oil spot price drop in half from your proposals, what you would be more likely to see is massive price swings in short term periods as producers and consumers rush to lock in contracts knowing there was no guarantee of a strong secondary market after the break of any positive/negative news relevant to the market. Do not let yourself be misled into socialist type fallacies because of emotional reasons.
You wouldn't believe how many socialists are on these forums that have no clue about how the markets work & what property-rights mean & what Ron Paul stands for!
Welcome to the forums by the way, the more free marketers are here the better for the movement so that it doesn't get taken over by socialists
