Prodigious US shale oil production is often treated as a threat to deepwater. Won’t all this oil swamp demand? Many investment banks and government agencies forecasting oil markets feel that it could. The evidence, however, suggests differently. We have contended that the world is short of oil, and this shortage, rather than changes in habits or demographics, is driving decreasing oil consumption in the advanced countries. If the oil supply increases, then any overhang will be quickly absorbed. And that’s what the record shows: US product supplied (effectively, US oil demand) reached 20 mbpd in the last four weeks, up a whopping 1 mbpd (5.3%) from the same period last year.
