Re: Fuel Prices, don't let the facts get in the way.

His, Klaso, job is to view the entire industry, not just a given number of
stations, or just the stations in a region. Granted his "typical stations
needs to move 100,000 gallons a month" may not match what the stations you
service sell, so what's your number for the typical volume of all stations?
How far off is he? I see a very simple way that both his number and
whatever number you come up with are both right. The analyist has total
numbers and regional numbers for volume and outlets. Your outlets may or
may not be typical of those across the region and the country. His typical
number, and he only mentioned these numbers in one or two sentences during
the 10 minutes he was on the air, may be too much of an average figure and
not a better median figure.

I guess it depends on knowing if your area of responsibility is a nationally
representative area and if your estimate of the actual number is 90,000
gallons per month or 10,000 gallons per month. Is he a tiny bit off or he's
lucky he knows he's talking about gasoline to begin with?

One reason I'm hesitant to discount the analysts numbers quickly is it is
his job to know these numbers. His reports are sold to the investment and
energy industries. It's hard to become a long-term source, as he is, if
your customers can't trust your work.

How would a listed corporation even attempt to forego profit on it's
operations? I'm not sure why you ask what would the stockholders do if the
management of their investment told them we will deliberately avoid see that
investment pay off. What would you do if your bank said some of your
checking account was donated to a worthy charity? You wouldn't be so
cold-hearted as to tell them about your mortgage payment bouncing would you?
The people that own the equipment and profits/losses of any traded company
are the stockholders, not the management they hire. The oil companies don't
dictate the price of oil, the collected supply/demand of the market dictates
price. Oil companies providing product at the market price is no more
immoral than you selling your house to the highest bidder. I'm still
waiting for someone to show me where they sold their house for the cost of
materials or for their original purchase price. With all the people
violently opposed to selling at the market price I'm beginning to wonder if
those people are hypocrits or worse?

How's this for a conspiracy theory? Oil companies fund environmental groups
so vast regions of oil production can't be exploited. Scarce oil equals
higher profits. Maybe RFK, Jr. is on the payroll of ExxonMobil? ;-)

I'm not sure what is the nature of these trade secrest you keep referring
to. Maybe you could tell me how they influence profits, if not actually
what those secrets are? It seems to me if you are referring to the
marketing department's claims about various ingredients and such, fewer and
fewer people by into that than ever before. Even many of the suckers that
unnecessarily buy premium fuels switch each time prices go up and those
people seldom return to it ever again. I don't just trust something if I
can read it, I trust the econ-nazis to scream foul and the corporations to
scream foul and the consumers to scream foul, etc., etc. I also know that
if there is anything to these screams you'll be able to track down the
evidence. That's why I spend 10 hours a day, every day, listening to mostly
liberal sources and balance them with other sources. Each side will point
out the weakness of the other and with a little practice it's easy to
develop the skills/sources to track down who is being straight and who is
just trotting out argument 902B because it's Tuesday and the topic is X.

--
Scott

As a patriotic American liberal, I will not attempt to 'understand' the
terrorists, or 'explain' their behavior, or blame their victims. Instead, I
will recognize that the United States, while far from perfect, is the most
progressive and inclusive society in the history of the world. - Sherman
Alexie
"gashauler" <swordfish2@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:PI-dnf4g4dwD3YbeRVn-gg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> "tscottme" <blahblah@xxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> news:qsidnZ2dnZ2QfB66nZ2dne_kh96dnZ2dRVn-0J2dnZ0@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > Klosa said many stations need to move 100,000 gallons per month and some
> > stations move 500,000 per month. He didn't say most staions move
500,000
> > or
> > that 500,000 is the volume of the average staions. In any event, not
one
> > of
> > his points hinged on an accurate estimate of the average station's
volume.
>
> 500,000 gallons a month is very rare and 100,000 a month is great from my
> experiences of delivering gasoline. I just said if he doesn't know the
true
> picture of gasoline sales then his entire testimony becomes suspicious.
For
> a station to become a major seller the station needs a store where the
soda
> is marked up 200%
>
> >
> > Companies and their officers have what is called a fiduciary
> > responsibility
> > toward their stockholders. That means, rightly or wrongly, they ought
to
> > seek to maximize the value of the company for the benefit of those
> > stockholders.
>
> I've said this all along. They're in business to make money. One statement
> I've made is what would happen if the oil company said we're not going to
> make a profit so everyone can get ahead on fuel prices. What would the
stock
> holders that depend on that income say?
>
>
> All large corporations make donations to charities as well as
> > politicians.
>
>
> Money already donated to the Red Cross; Chevron 5 million, BP 5 million
and
> 100,000 gallons of diesel to run generators and emergency vehicles, Exxon
7
> million, Sunoco 1 million, Hess 1 million, Citgo 1 million, and I'm sure
> there's more.
>
>
> >
> > This isn't a personal attack on anyone. Isn't it interesting that those
> > the
> > quickest to condemn oil suppliers are also the people not willing to
> > investigate the matter before they make attacks.
>
> I agree, but I'm also cautious on the material on the internet. I don't
have
> all the answers and would never claim to but I do know that not all the
> information on how the oil companies work is out there for the general
> public to see. And I also know that the oil companies work together on
many
> items. In fact the only items one company won't tell the other is trade
> secrets. But they know anyway. The work together but they also spy on each
> other. Sometime you might see a young person well dressed getting a gallon
> of gas a putting it into the truck of the rental car. They just might be
> taking that gallon back to the lab.
>
>
>
> Isn't it interesting that
> > for all the huff and puff about unwarranted price gouging the issue
isn't
> > important enough to the CB experts to look up any of the publically
> > available info.
>
> That will give you the general knowledge and a good place to start.
>
>
> It's just like school, the people that talk during class
> > and won't do their homework are the first people to ascribe good grades
to
> > being lucky or preferential treatment. This sort of info isn't password
> > protected. Much of all pertinent info is available from the oil
companies
> > themselves or the government, it just takes a lot of digging and most
> > people
> > would rather have the complaint and a convenient villian than take a
> > chance
> > on running across contrary data.
> >
> > Oil is a commodity. It trades like any other commodity and it's priced
> > like
> > any other commodity. You bet if the market bids up the price for the
> > commodity the sellers make more money off the commodity. That's not
some
> > dark secret peculiar to oil. When people tell me how they've discovered
> > the
> > that oil companies are making big profits when their product has tripled
> > in
> > value over a relatively short period, they aren't telling me much about
> > oil
> > companies but they are telling me a bundle about themselves. If anyone
is
> > living in a hot housing market I defy them to show me where they have
> > foregon selling their house for the inflated price and just sought to
> > recoup
> > their original purchase price plus inflation. What I see is large
numbers
> > of people very isolated from anything but holding a steering wheel that
> > also
> > have an unwarranted certaintity that they can uderstand the whole world
> > without any investigation and by just making off the cuff remarks.
> >
> >
> I fully agree with you that if most would look up the general information
> on the companies maybe then they would understand and not just bitch. But
> they won't and the oil companies will always have a target on their backs.
>
>


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