IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/diw/diwrup/58en.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

What about the OPEC Cartel?

Author

Listed:
  • Daniel Huppmann
  • Franziska Holz

Abstract

The recent decision by the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) not to decrease their output quota in spite of a drastic decline of crude oil prices has brought renewed attention to this supplier group dominating the crude oil market. However, the empirical evidence that OPEC truly acts as a textbook cartel is rather limited. This Roundup summarizes the theories proposed over the past decades to explain the fundamental structure of the crude oil market and the role of OPEC and Saudi Arabia, the pivotal supplier. The consensus in the academic literature points towards the interpretation that the group is acting as a non-cooperative oligopoly. We relate the theories to alternative interpretations of the price drop over the autumn of 2014.

Suggested Citation

  • Daniel Huppmann & Franziska Holz, 2015. "What about the OPEC Cartel?," DIW Roundup: Politik im Fokus 58, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:diw:diwrup:58en
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.diw.de/documents/publikationen/73/diw_01.c.498387.de/DIW_Roundup_58_en.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dibooglu, Sel & AlGudhea, Salim N., 2007. "All time cheaters versus cheaters in distress: An examination of cheating and oil prices in OPEC," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 31(3), pages 292-310, September.
    2. Spiro, Daniel, 2014. "Resource prices and planning horizons," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 159-175.
    3. Kaufmann, Robert K. & Ullman, Ben, 2009. "Oil prices, speculation, and fundamentals: Interpreting causal relations among spot and futures prices," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(4), pages 550-558, July.
    4. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1313 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Daniel Huppmann, 2013. "Endogenous Shifts in OPEC Market Power: A Stackelberg Oligopoly with Fringe," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1313, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    6. James L. Smith, 2009. "World Oil: Market or Mayhem?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 23(3), pages 145-164, Summer.
    7. Harold Hotelling, 1931. "The Economics of Exhaustible Resources," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 39(2), pages 137-137.
    8. A.F. Alhajji & David Huettner, 2000. "The Target Revenue Model and the World Oil Market: Empirical Evidence from 1971 to 1994," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 2), pages 121-144.
    9. Daniel Huppmann and Franziska Holz, 2012. "Crude Oil Market Power—A Shift in Recent Years?," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alberto Behar & Robert A. Ritz, 2016. "OPEC vs US shale oil: Analyzing the shift to a market-share strategy," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1623, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    2. Lin, Jilei & Eck, Daniel J., 2021. "Minimizing post-shock forecasting error through aggregation of outside information," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 1710-1727.
    3. Ansari, Dawud, 2017. "OPEC, Saudi Arabia, and the shale revolution: Insights from equilibrium modelling and oil politics," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 111, pages 166-178.
    4. Mr. Alberto Behar & Robert A Ritz, 2016. "An Analysis of OPEC’s Strategic Actions, US Shale Growth and the 2014 Oil Price Crash," IMF Working Papers 2016/131, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Behar, Alberto & Ritz, Robert A., 2017. "OPEC vs US shale: Analyzing the shift to a market-share strategy," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 185-198.
    6. Baumann, Alexendra & Wohlrabe, Klaus, 2019. "Publikationen von Wirtschaftsforschungsinstituten im deutschsprachigen Raum - Eine bibliometrische Analyse [Publications of Economic Research Insitutes in the German Speaking Area - A bibliometric ," MPRA Paper 92240, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Berk, Istemi & Çam, Eren, 2020. "The shift in global crude oil market structure: A model-based analysis of the period 2013–2017," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    8. Zirgulis Aras, 2016. "The Impact of Oil Refinery Market Power on Retail Fuel Prices in the European Union," Ekonomika (Economics), Sciendo, vol. 95(3), pages 37-51, December.
    9. Berk, Istemi & Çam , Eren, 2019. "The Shift in Global Crude Oil Market Structure: A model-based analysis of the period 2013–2017," EWI Working Papers 2019-5, Energiewirtschaftliches Institut an der Universitaet zu Koeln (EWI).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Durand-Lasserve, Olivier & Pierru, Axel, 2021. "Modeling world oil market questions: An economic perspective," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 159(C).
    2. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1313 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Daniel Huppmann, 2013. "Endogenous Shifts in OPEC Market Power: A Stackelberg Oligopoly with Fringe," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1313, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    4. Mr. Alberto Behar & Robert A Ritz, 2016. "An Analysis of OPEC’s Strategic Actions, US Shale Growth and the 2014 Oil Price Crash," IMF Working Papers 2016/131, International Monetary Fund.
    5. Daniel Huppmann and Franziska Holz, 2012. "Crude Oil Market Power—A Shift in Recent Years?," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 4).
    6. Behar, Alberto & Ritz, Robert A., 2017. "OPEC vs US shale: Analyzing the shift to a market-share strategy," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 185-198.
    7. Alberto Behar & Robert A. Ritz, 2016. "OPEC vs US shale oil: Analyzing the shift to a market-share strategy," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 1623, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    8. Golombek, Rolf & Irarrazabal, Alfonso A. & Ma, Lin, 2018. "OPEC's market power: An empirical dominant firm model for the oil market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 98-115.
    9. Even Comfort Hvinden, 2019. "OPEC's crude game," Working Papers No 10/2019, Centre for Applied Macro- and Petroleum economics (CAMP), BI Norwegian Business School.
    10. Daniel Huppmann & Franziska Holz, 2012. "Crude Oil Market Power—A Shift in Recent Years?," The Energy Journal, , vol. 33(4), pages 1-22, October.
    11. Reynolds, Douglas B. & Pippenger, Michael K., 2010. "OPEC and Venezuelan oil production: Evidence against a cartel hypothesis," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(10), pages 6045-6055, October.
    12. Quemin, Simon & Trotignon, Raphaël, 2021. "Emissions trading with rolling horizons," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    13. Gregor Schwerhoff & Ottmar Edenhofer & Marc Fleurbaey, 2020. "Taxation Of Economic Rents," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 34(2), pages 398-423, April.
    14. Quemin, Simon, 2022. "Raising climate ambition in emissions trading systems: The case of the EU ETS and the 2021 review," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    15. Valenti, Daniele & Bastianin, Andrea & Manera, Matteo, 2023. "A weekly structural VAR model of the US crude oil market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    16. Okullo, Samuel J. & Reynès, Frédéric & Hofkes, Marjan W., 2015. "Modeling peak oil and the geological constraints on oil production," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(C), pages 36-56.
    17. Smith, James L., 2012. "On the portents of peak oil (and other indicators of resource scarcity)," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 68-78.
    18. repec:diw:diwwpp:dp1548 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. Renaud Coulomb & Oskar Lecuyer & Adrien Vogt-Schilb, 2019. "Optimal Transition from Coal to Gas and Renewable Power Under Capacity Constraints and Adjustment Costs," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 73(2), pages 557-590, June.
    20. Hache, Emmanuel & Lantz, Frédéric, 2013. "Speculative trading and oil price dynamic: A study of the WTI market," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(C), pages 334-340.
    21. Huppmann, Daniel & Egging, Ruud, 2014. "Market power, fuel substitution and infrastructure – A large-scale equilibrium model of global energy markets," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 483-500.
    22. Ron Alquist & Olivier Gervais, 2013. "The Role of Financial Speculation in Driving the Price of Crude Oil," The Energy Journal, , vol. 34(3), pages 35-54, July.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:diw:diwrup:58en. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Bibliothek (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/diwbede.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.