November 8, 2006 –
Here’s something that I learned today about the peak oil theory that I didn’t know that seals my skepticism about its validity. The theory of Peak Oil was invented by Marion King Hubbert in 1956. Who did Marion King Hubbert work for? You guessed it. Shell Oil. Again, there is believed to be 375 billion barrels of oil in the Arctic North. Shale oil in the United States? 1 trillion barrels. And oil sands in Canada and Venezuela? Another possible 2 trillion barrels. To put this in perspective, Saudi Arabia has 260 billion barrels of oil reserves.
When Y2K came and passed without so much as a single glitch, though I have no idea who invented the Y2K scare, if I had to place a bet, I would put my money on some guy that worked for for some big tech company.
When I used to work for some of the largest investment firms in the wealthiest markets in the U.S., everytime the bigshot economists hired by the firm with their PhDs spoke about the state of the markets to the firms’ clients, they were always bullish about the markets. In fact they were notorious for never being bearish about the markets, because after all, if they were bearish about the markets, how in the world would this attitude convince their clients to fork over more millions to the firm? I always laughed because these guys sounded like a broken record, touting that great markets were on the horizon over and over and over again, so much so that I thought their PhDs stood for Plenty of Hot air & Doo doo. They were some of the highest paid cheerleaders I’ve ever encountered.
So next time, you hear another grandiose theory or proponent of a theory, always consider the source. Good investing…J.S.
