Since the financialisation of global crude oil trading, its price movements have attracted worldwide attention from investors, policy-makers, scholars and the general public. Since oil powers production and underpins mobility in nearly all industries and sectors, global leaders are concerned about the economic burden that the era of high oil prices generates, especially in the major oil-importing, fast-growing countries, such as China and India. Different from the natural gas market, the global oil market is highly integrated, meaning that oil prices in different regions are so synchronised that a local crisis in a relevant place could send global oil prices to sky-high.
The volatile and less predictable nature of oil prices has also created the need and opportunity for hedging funds, but at the same time, many have speculated that the hedging funds have ironically been responsible for the creation of bubbles through their large capital injection and speculation. In the second decade of the 21th century, new developments have taken root and invites more timely discussion.
For instance, the American shale bonanza, which is bound to make US energy independent, has been a game-changer not only for gas but also for oil. Given a set of complicated reasons, Brent crude oil prices surpassed WTI prices in 2010, a development unseen since the launch of crude oil futures in the 1980s. The international and sub-national crises, such as those observed in Iran, Libya, Syria and Ukraine, have added extra uncertainties to crude oil price forecasts. This special issue, therefore, seeks to invite international experts to share their insights on these matters in order to shed light upon the future development of crude oil pricing and its policy implications.
Topics include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Crude oil pricing mechanisms
- Crude oil price volatility
- Crude oil price risk measurement
- Crude oil price forecast modelling
- Crude oil price bubble
- Crude oil market regulations and reforms
- Crude oil price and economic growth
- Crude oil prices and financial market prices
- Crude oil market information spillover
Important Dates
Submission of Manuscripts: 31 August, 2014
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