There are "corridors of newspaper bales," and piles of equipment, collectibles and junk: "the guts of pianos, motors wrapped in their power cords, boxes of tools, paintings, car body parts, tires, stacked chairs, tables on tables, headboards, barrels, collapsed stacks of books, antique lamps," piles of clothing and rolled-up carpets.
The presumption is that the price of oil, now $35 a barrel, will collapse and take Exxon's profits with it.
It was the strongest quarter for Exxon since it set a corporate quarterly earnings record in 2008, when crude oil prices approached $150 a barrel before collapsing as the world economy slowed.
"The Oil Bubble: Set to Burst?" That was the headline of an October 2004 article in National Review, which argued that oil prices, then $50 a barrel, would soon collapse.
Wall Street analysts continued to lower their predictions of where oil prices are headed in 2015, with some projecting that global oil prices could break below even $50 a barrel — the biggest collapse since prices briefly plunged by about two-thirds during the most recent recession.
Alaska crude hit a four-year low of $60.80 a barrel Thursday, a collapse that threatens jobs, public services and some of the ambitious infrastructure projects needed to harness and navigate the state's vast natural landscape.
But despite the decline in demand, oil prices are still bouncing around $60 a barrel, instead of collapsing back to the 1986 recession level of $20 a barrel (2009 dollars).
According to the Associated Press, he told reporters that the bridge "collapsed because so much money was spent on wasteful, unnecessary pork-barrel projects". The collapse, which killed 13, remains under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board, but authorities suspect a "serious design error" as a factor.
The possible culprit here is oil, which has bounced back to $68 a barrel after last year's collapse.
