Oil, Gas Prices | featured news

The United States is pressing Saudi Arabia to boost oil output to fill a likely supply gap arising from sanctions on Iran, Gulf oil officials said, adding that an increase in production is unlikely to be needed before July.

Against the backdrop of gasoline prices rising at the pump in an election year, a new Obama administration report cites “significant progress” in reducing foreign oil imports and increasing domestic oil and gas production.

Following GOP strategy, Fox News is again blaming the Obama Administration for rising gas prices -- a claim that has been repeatedly debunked by energy analysts. But back in the summer of 2008 when the average U.S. gasoline price hit a record high of $4.11, Fox said that "no President has the power to increase or to lower gas prices" and the only way to reduce our vulnerability to gas price spikes is to use less oil.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration is weighing the circumstances that could warrant tapping the nation's strategic oil reserve, aware that supply disruptions from Iran could harm the global economy, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said on Friday.

The International Energy Agency says 28 countries have agreed to release 60 million barrels of crude to the market to offset disruptions prompted by Libya's war.

Congress should take steps to limit speculation in oil markets, which has boosted prices as much as 30 percent, a new report from the Democratic staff of a House of Representatives oversight committee said on Monday.

With gasoline prices hovering at $4 a gallon nationally, many Americans are making tough choices: scaling back summer vacations, driving less or ditching the car altogether. Some seniors are choosing a tank of gas over their prescriptions....

A GOP bid to expand and hasten offshore oil drilling in the face of $4-a-gallon gasoline prices suffered an overwhelming defeat in the Senate on Wednesday, four days after President Barack Obama directed his administration to ramp up U.S. oil production....

The Senate blocked a bill Tuesday that would repeal about $2 billion a year in tax breaks for the five biggest oil companies, a Democratic response to $4-a-gallon gasoline that might fare better when Congress and the White House negotiate a deal later this year to increase the government's ability to borrow.

Rex Tillerson, the boss of ExxonMobil admitted last week that the price of oil–based purely on supply and demand- should be in the $60 to $70 a barrel range. The reason it’s above $100 a barrel, Tillerson explained, is due to the oil majors using futures contracts to lock in current high prices, and speculation that is engineered by the high-frequency trading of quantitative hedge funds.