Commodities: the seed-corn is money

The oil price briefly hit a record $89 a barrel on Wednesday. Traders were talking Turkey and Iraq, but the real story is something else. It’s why the price of oil and other commodities is up rather than down since the beginning of the credit squeeze in August. After all, the price of a scarce asset is set by the amount of money buyers can find to pay up. The credit squeeze should have reduced that supply. To the extent that oil is a financial asset, it should have suffered just like houses or ...