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Here's how insanely volatile oil prices have been this year

Feb 11, 2016, 04:12 IST

We've seen some epic swings in crude oil prices to start 2016.

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And as this chart from Strategas shows, there have been 24 days in 2016 during which oil prices have moved by more than 5% intra-day.

Trading has only taken place on 26 days.

In the few years before oil prices crashed last year, a move this big was a rare occurrence and in 2013 there was no day with a trading range this wide.

For a sense of how epic oil trading is shaping up to be in 2016, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange announced earlier today that it saw a trading volume record on Tuesday for West Texas Intermediate light sweet crude oil futures on as 1.6 million contracts traded hands.

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On Tuesday, crude oil prices nosedived, with WTI futures in New York falling by more than 6% and below $28 a barrel with the sell-off coming amid more signs from the International Energy Agency that OPEC oil production continues rising.

This year, crude oil is down 25%, after peaking just above $38 on the first trading day of the year.

Crude oil futures fell to a three-week low on Wednesday, falling about 2% to trade near $27.40 a barrel.

Strategas

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