Group Calls for Swift Action to Curb, Regulate Energy Speculators,
'Today's Enron Rogues'
SANTA MONICA, Calif., March 10 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --Congress and
President Bush must take joint action against the speculators who have
driven oil and gasoline prices past all-time records, said OilWatchdog.org,
a project of the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights. Gasoline
prices nationally are expected today to surpass last year's record of
$3.227, and California, at $3.571 per gallon as calculated by AAA, is more
than 7 cents a gallon over last year's record.
"There is no shortage of gasoline, no shortage of crude oil, no
underlying market reason for these excruciating record prices," said Judy
Dugan, research director of OilWatchdog and the nonprofit, nonpartisan
FTCR. "Speculators and hedge funds, today's Enron rogues, are driving an
economic disaster by pouring billions into bets on continually rising
prices."
Oil today spiked to more than $107.00 a barrel, though the U.S. dollar
stabilized in value against other currencies including the Euro. A weak
dollar, in any case, is not nearly reason enough for spot oil prices to be
more than double last year's January low of just above $51 a barrel, said
OilWatchdog. Last March, as gasoline prices started spiking to their
previous record, oil was still under $60 a barrel.
(See historical oil prices at
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/rwtcd.htm )
"With gasoline prices averaging more than a penny-a-day increase,
prices of $4.00 a gallon are popping up across California and other states
can see their future in what is happening there," said Dugan. "Yet
President Bush said earlier this month he hadn't even heard about
predictions of $4.00 gasoline, and Congress seems to be hiding its head in
the sand. Energy prices should also be atop the issues for the presidential
candidates, but the oil lobby's clout suffocates even that debate."
Either the White House or Congress should initiate hearings on and
investigations of unregulated energy trading markets, where manipulation of
large trades can drive up prices on all markets, said OilWatchdog. A
proposal to put some modest oversight and regulation on U.S. trades in the
unregulated markets passed the Senate last December but it was folded into
the federal farm bill, which is stuck in unrelated disputes over the
funding of farm subsidies.
"The electronic energy trading markets, including the InterContinental
Exchange, are exempt from all regulation because of what's called the
'Enron Loophole," said Dugan. "The same energy bandits who nearly turned
out the lights in California in 2000 pushed aside federal regulation that
could have spotted manipulation and curbed this year's disastrous price
spike. Government is still asleep at the wheel."
Oil refineries have also been cutting back production, which spikes
gasoline prices independent of oil prices. Families are running up credit
card debt just to buy gasoline and the economy is battered from both sides
by energy-caused inflation and recession, said FTCR.
The beneficiaries of this, aside from the speculators, are oil
companies and foreign oil producers reaping record profits, said FTCR.
FTCR and OilWatchdog call for:
-- Swift action to close the Enron Loophole in commodity trading
regulation. The measure that is stuck in the farm bill should be passed
again as a separate bill (S.2058 by Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Carl Levin)
to help stop speculative pricing. (See more on Enron Loophole and farm bill
amendment at http://www.oilwatchdog.org/articles/?storyId=18735)
-- Senate approval of an alternative fuels bill funded by withdrawing
$1.8 billion a year in unjustified taxpayer subsidies to oil companies.
This measure, passed by the House last week, faces an uncertain future in
the Senate. A similar House measure was removed from the federal energy
bill by the Senate last year under pressure from the oil lobby. (Text of HR
5351 can be found at http://thomas.loc.gov/)
-- Statements of intent by the presidential candidates. Today's
presidential candidates must do more than make disapproving noises about
today's energy crisis, said OilWatchdog. They must let voters know how they
plan to keep the oil lobby out of the White House and stop this from
happening again.
SOURCE Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights
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Related links:
http://thomas.loc.gov
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/rwtcd.htm
http://www.consumerwatchdog.org
http://www.oilwatchdog.org/
CONTACT:
Judy Dugan, +1-310 392-0522, ext. 305, or
Jamie Court, +1-310 392-0522, ext. 327, both of Foundation for
Taxpayer and Consumer Rights
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