British Petroleum's Marketing Strategy in a Changing Business Environment

Oil is the product that each and every one of us use. It can be used for fuel, heating and even cooking. The most often known for unstable price is crude oil or gasoline. According to the The Economist, The main reason for price shifts of oil is oversupply. The oil production in Saudi rose 10.3 million barrels per day. This increase is the effect of a new method that I being applied to oil extraction. This method is called fracking, fracking is where they drill into tight-rock formations then gradually turning horizontal for several thousand feet more. This results to accommodations to multiple oil wells. This new approved method of oil harvesting has raised the productivity gains and reduced the cost of harvesting oil.

In 2016, the crude oil price movement prices were unpredictable. The OPEC reference basket dropped 10 percent to $43.22 per pound. The ICE Brent and NYMEX WTI both went down by 8.4 percent with ICE Brent at $47.08 per pound and NYMEX WTI at $45.76 per pound. This showed that there were uncertainties in the petroleum market. The future prices were predicted for 2017 that it would move higher. The World’s economic growth predictions was the same at 2.9% for 2016 but increased to 3.1% for 2017. Because of the 3rd quarter of 2016 in Japan and US, the OCED growth went from 1.6% to 1.7%. The demand for oil growth in 2016 has been increasing slightly to 1.24 mb/d. In 2017, the demand will be predicted with a decrease to 1.15 mb/d. OECD will

Several oil-countries have been facing economic and political turbulence as a result of the crash in oil prices, and there is disagreement among OPEC as how to handle the situation. (Krauss) While this is happening, America’s oil production continues to rise, as it inches closer to becoming an energy superpower in production and consumption; and countries that depend on their oil exports face recession.

The consensus from the 1970s and 1980s was that there was an inverse relationship between oil prices and real economic activities. This belief later changed when the oil price crash of the mid-1980s failed to boost economic growth. Researchers then believed that increasing oil prices negatively affect the economy whereas falling oil prices have very little impact and by the 1990s this impact was assumed to be minimal (DePratto, de Resende and Maier 2009). More recently, researchers have found that increases in the oil prices adversely affect the economy whereas the impact of a decline in oil prices on GDP growth is only negligible (Jimenez-Rodriguez and Sanchez

The United States consumes more than 25% of the world’s petroleum products which is a large percentage, considering only 3% of the world’s oil reserves are produced by the United States. Given the demand for petroleum products such as gasoline, understanding why Crude oil prices have skyrocketed in recent years, is not hard. According to the article “Ending America’s Oil Addiction,” the surge in crude oil prices can be reduced in large part to the simple concepts of supply and demand. (Cooper, 2008)

When trading oil it pays to keep an eye on the major consuming nations, as any increase or decrease in usage is sure to have an impact on the commodities performance. Something that is also worth monitoring – with this tying into the performance of major consuming nations – is OPEC, the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. This international organisation works to ensure both the stablisaiton of the oil markets, along with coordinate and unify petroleum policies. Current members of OPEC include mass-producing oil nations (13 in total, including Saudi Arabia, UAE, Iran, Iraq, and Qatar). Considering that OPEC has the power to decide policies related to the production and sale of petroleum oil, it certainly has the power to impact the price, flow, and distribution of oil worldwide.

The causes for WTI crude oil and its price changes are all about supply and demand. If consumers are trying to cut down on there use of oil because it is getting to expensive then the supply is higher then the demand therefor the price of oil will go down to try and get consumers to buy more oil and stimulate the oil trade. If a large amount of people are demanding oil and the supply cannot keep up with the demand then the demand is higher than the supply therefor the price will go up to slow down the trading of oil.

It is operating facilities or making products in most of the world’s countries and explore for oil and natural gas on six continents. More than 80% of its earnings are generated from non-U.S. markets. With high performing operations and global integration, ExxonMobil is one of the best positioned firms to provide against a change in commodity prices. Moreover, the diversity of its operations and a various geographic footprint is a key component for managing unpredictable political risk and protecting against regional economic

        Oil prices in the years 2000-2001 rose due to OPEC's decision to cut the supply of oil that was being produced. Foreign relations with the United States did little to the price increase of

For example, the Intercontinental Exchange while oil prices have not been decided on by oil producers such as Niami refinery fires, Nigerian Pirates and global oil markets. The laws of demand and supply are also predicted by the increase and decrease in the prices of oil. Oil prices are driven by the increase in demand for oil which has limited or completely destroyed the gains for suppliers and producers. While the U.S still consumes more oil than any other country, it is evident from the increase in oil demand that developing countries such as China, India and Japan are driving oil prices higher by their continous growth in oil demand (Anderson, 1).

Oil prices hike or drop is normally a major concern to researchers, industries as well as the government. Oil majorly affects the operations of all sectors of economy in any nation. From analysis and monitoring of oil prices, it has been observed that oil prices went down from the second half of 2014. This was unexpected because oil prices had stabilized for about four years with each barrel costing 105 US Dollars (Miller 11). According to a research and simulation done by researchers in 2014, there was a prediction speculating oil prices would remain low in 2015 and marginally rise in 2016. However, in 2015 there has been a very sharp decline of oil prices. It is out of this concern that this papers the aims at addressing the following questions.

Fuel costs can change rapidly, making it difficult for consumers to adjust to the system. In fact, the petroleum industry is one of the

Graph 1 represents the major companies and nations which product crude oil. It also represents how the bent crude oil price has fluctuated from 2004 until 2014. From 2004-2008 it is evident that there is a steady rise in oil prices, from $35-$150 per barrel. Towards the end of 2008 it is evident that there is a significant drop in oil prices, from $150- $32 per barrel. This is due to the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) where the stock market collapsed on October 28, 1928, through this came the rapid decrease in oil prices. From 2009-2011 there is a steady increase in oil prices which was caused by the stock market repairing itself from impact of the GFC. In 2013 we are able to see declining oil

Shale revolution started about ten years ago due to technological developments such horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing. The increasing exploitation of shale oil significantly affected the oil market. In this report, WTI oil price was predicted over the next five years using historical data. A discussion of major factors that historically affected oil prices is presented. Historical events were linked to current and expected future events to evaluate the predicted prices. To further evaluate the forecasted prices, they were compared to the predicted prices by the Economy Forecast Agency.

The volatility of crude oil prices have been experienced since the end of the 20th century. The March 1999 spikes were experienced due to the restriction of crude oil production and cooperation among OPEC member states, the growth of oil demand in Asia that signified its recovery following the Asian financial crisis and decreased production from non-OPEC countries (Al-Abri, 2013). The world market reacted with a sharp rise in prices with the increase in crude oil going beyond 30USD/barrel in the last quarter of 2000 (Chen, Hamori and Kinkyo, 2014). OPEC countries tried to stabilize prices through the increase or reduction in production to a range of 22USD per barrel to 28USD per barrel (Ghosh and Kanjilal, 2014). The incident on September 2001 caused a deep reduction in crude oil prices, irrespective of earlier decreases in production by exporters that are non-OPEC and quota reduction by OPEC countries. After a short while, prices rose to 25USD per barrel with prices going beyond this in 2004 to about 40USD per barrel (Jimenez-Rodriguez, 2011).