Can we buy oil now, and keep it in the ground? Will that have a significant effect? Bloomberg NEF wants to have that discussion. Their take: No. My take: "Buy" when prices are negative, as now, and buy depleted oil wells to pump it into. At a profit overall. Or nationalize all fossil fuel resources, and dissolve the industry as fast as we can build out renewables to replace it. Turn the remaining asset value back to shareholders and be done with it.
To make an activist buyout work, we have to be able to predict that oil futures prices will sometimes go negative, which they have never done before. But we have never before seen such cuts to demand. And we know that cuts to demand will get ever more severe once the driving public understands that EVs are cheaper than gas guzzlers, as they are now on leases, and soon will be for purchases, too.
Discuss.