This study seeks to explain why crude oil prices fluctuate, the main cause being the quota regime, which characterises the OPEC agreements. Given that the Saudi oil supply is inelastic in the short term, a shock in the oil market is accommodated by an immediate price change. In contrast, a...

In recent years, our understanding of the nature of energy price shocks and their effects on the economy has evolved dramatically. Only a few years ago, the prevailing view in the literature was that at least the major crude oil prices increases were exogenous with respect to the OECD economies...

This paper evaluates whether macroeconomic uncertainty changes the impact of oil shocks on the oil price. Using a structural threshold VAR model, we endogenously identify different regimes of uncertainty in which we estimate the effects of oil demand and supply shocks. The results show that...

While some of the recent surge of oil prices can be attributed to robust global demand at a time of tight production capacities, commentators occasionally also blame the impact of speculators for part of the price pressure. We propose an empirical oil market model with heterogeneous speculators....

Analysis of oil-price movements is once again an important feature of economic policy discussions. To provide some background for this analysis, this paper summarizes a conference on the oil market held at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in June 2010. Four cross-cutting themes emerged from...

Chartist and fundamentalist models have proven to be capable of replicating stylized facts on speculative markets. In general, this is achieved by specifying nonlinear interactions of otherwise linear asset price expectations of the respective trader groups. This paper investigates whether or...