Quote from Landis82:
While it's true that there appeared to be an awful lot of shenanigans going on ( Thank You ICE, Phil Gramm, among others like Platt's and their widely used price-reporting system that may have tipped off owners of storage tankers), I do seem to recall that the Israeli's had asked the United States for permission to fly over Iraqi airspace and deliver a few American made bunker-busting bombs on Iran's main nuclear reactor in Natanz last Spring.
Bush declined the Israeli's request for permission to fly over Iraq, not too mention using American made bunker-busting bombs, and our State Dept. never heard back from the Israelis for quite some time . . . fueling the uncertainty of whether or not an attack on Natanz was imminent.
Thus, people "in the know" were well aware that Iran was about to go "offline"--- hoarding crude and bidding it up to outrageous prices.
Semgroup Holdings must have been out of the foreign intelligence loop.
And the prudent risk management loop and the "bad if not worse case scenario plan" loop.
A short position equivalent to 20% of the nation's crude inventories?
Even assuming that the article excludes SPR bbls - that is a crazy position.
I think the guy kept fading the rally. Any number of things could have happened and he would have lost his grip.
Geo-political stuff. Competitive gaming. Uh, maybe BOTH at the same time. I have no opinion on the GS role or non-role in this. But there has to be some commentary on them initiating a position that large relative to their capital.
So here it is.
