Malaysia Petrol Price Increase
We need to try and make sense of the impending 78sen petrol price hike tomorrow 5th June 2008. What is it that has caused the price of oil to jump so much in such a short time? Economist will say is an imbalance in supply and demand and yet all oil companies and OPEC is saying that there is sufficient supply. So if supply is sufficient, what else can it be?
Since 9-11, all sorts of funny phenomena have been taking place in the global economy. Fundamental has been the continued decline in the value of the US dollar. While the Malaysian government trumps is economic success as demonstrated in the strengthening of the Ringgit against the US dollar, the reality is that it is the US dollar has weakened against most currencies. To validate this, just ask how come the EURO, Aussies dollar and Sing dollar have all increased in value against the Ringgit?
The only reality that we have to accept is that the US dollar has come to a point where is has or is anticipated to have no value. As a result, american fund traders have given up on trading currency that is valueless to trading commodities that have intrinsic value.
So these traders have been buying up commodities futures – palm oil, grains, and oil. As these are speculative purchases of forward contracts, the issues of “real supply” does not come into play as the contracts just get rolled on, except that every roll on increases the price of the traded commodity.
It has now come to a catch 22, if the governments of the world enforce the ban of trading oil contracts, oil prices will indeed come crashing down probably to USD 40 per barrel, but along with that these traders will loose billions if not trillions of dollars which in turn will turn us money to junk paper. However if the world and our government pass this cost down to the citizens, it will protect the profits of these traders while impoverishing millions of innocent people.
So what can we do? Well, a number of things. This first is not to kowtow to the power brokers, who I suspect already have us in their pockets….
The second is to realize God gifted to malaysia oil! And instead of sharing this wealth with the citizens, we allow oil companies to make ridiculous profits and I am not only talking about Petronas but also the other oil co’s in Malaysia like BP, ESSO, … So maybe one option is to tarriff the windfall profits from these oil companies and take the excess away from them to use to stbilise prices.
A more radical move is for Petronas to rise prices but not the whole 78 sen but say only 30 sen. It will immediately shift every consumer away from Shell / ESSO/BHP… into Petronas. Wouldn’t you switch too?
This will only force the other oil players to drop price to match petronas at their cost….
The speed, surprise and magnitude of this price increase is surely a sign that things are not good in BN land….
Yo bro.
Petrol increase has more or less doubled in US$ terms. But it’s only increased by 40% in Euro terms. Am I good or what?
It puts things into perspective on what is important for the majority of the population as compared to the now seemingly trivial matter of judicial reforms and the pay-off to the sacked judges in the previous adminsitration, which is now clearly an agenda pushed by a small minority of the population.
One of the main fallout from the price fuel hike is obviously going to be retrenchment and inflation rate going to the roof. Is there any plan to alleviate the burden of the people by Govt? In India, the government laid out plans on how to lift the burden of the consumer the same time the petrol price hike is announced – the focus is on the people. Our PM’s plan is more like a personal agenda to save his political career without any real care for the people.
Now it seems that the double track railway Project should not have been scrapped by the PM when he came to power. In hindsight, the current administration made too many wrong steps. There is an obvious lack of vision here and the intention is abviously to promote his image as a prudent leader.
When it comes to the crunch, what matters most is the ultimate question of whether there is going to be sufficient food on the table for the family. The rest is just rethoric.
These are the real issue that the Government should spend its time worrying about and then formulate a mitigating plan rather giving prominence to tired political stories.
The saying goes; “Cometh the hour, cometh the man”. Nobody is showing up.
My dear. Malaysia government held HUGE golden share in Shell Malaysia.
Its freaking funny when that stupid minister told rakyat that their spend all their saving from previous 30cent price increase on improving the public transport at KL. Unfortunately, that problem are far from over and none of us can see the impact or benefits from it.
And for latest price increase, once again their trying to make us believe that they will use some of OUR money to improve the public transport.
If they got brain (or guts..), just answer this simple questions:
1) What is the benefits for others rakyat which is not stay in KL? For instance, my area at Seremban are not accessible by bus and if take a taxi u’ll be charge minimum RM20 (soorii… not meter coz this is lpkp let the persatuan teksi control the taxi drivers.) and the rate will go up as high as RM40 if non-peak hour (takde orang masa balik nanti, rugilah…. kalau tanak jalan kaki ler…)
2) Show us the balance sheet of money expenses from previous saving and current saving from price increase. Make it transparent. No OSA… Yup, they are saaying they will use it this and that, but just show us the actual documents..
Malangnya, ada pihak (tycoon) yang menjadi kaya-raya dek kerana minyak sehingga baru-baru ini namanya tersenarai di tangga ke-20 dalam senarai di Forbes The Top 40 Richest Malaysians. Company dia juga sedang mengalami peningkatan stock.
Saya rujuk fakta ini di SINI, SINI dan SINI
Wah, boleh tahan itu Mokhzani, senyap2 duk kaya-raya kerana duit minyak… Anak siapa gak nya Mokhzani tu