Oil Will Stay Above $50 Per Barrel In 2020

We begin 2020 with the stock market again testing record highs. We just finished a year in which oil prices rose by more than 30 percent. However, natural gas prices closed the year nearly 40 percent lower, emphasizing the extent to which these two commodities have become unlinked. It’s also an election year. Those tend to inject additional unpredictability into the markets, as short-term decisions are often made to influence voters (e.g., releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to drive gasoline prices lower). Against this backdrop,…