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What can the oil futures curve tell us about the outlook for oil prices?

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Large movements in the oil price have had significant effects on UK CPI inflation over the past few years. In order to produce an inflation forecast, it is necessary to assume a path for oil and other commodity prices. The Monetary Policy Committee assumes that oil prices follow the path given by market futures prices when deciding their central projections for CPI inflation and GDP growth. This article considers arguments for and against using the futures curve as an assumed path and describes some of the other indicators used by the Committee in assessing the outlook for oil prices.

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  • Nixon, Dan & Smith, Tom, 2012. "What can the oil futures curve tell us about the outlook for oil prices?," Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, Bank of England, vol. 52(1), pages 39-47.
    • Handle: RePEc:boe:qbullt:0069
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    1. Valadkhani, Abbas, 2014. "Dynamic effects of rising oil prices on consumer energy prices in Canada and the United States: Evidence from the last half a century," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 33-44.
    2. Chuxiong Deng & Zhujun Jiang & Chuanwang Sun, 2018. "Estimating the Efficiency and Impacts of Petroleum Product Pricing Reforms in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-17, April.
    3. Ahmadov, Vugar & Huseynov, Salman & Mammadov, Fuad & Karimli, Tural, 2015. "Brent nefti opsiyonlarından neytral riskli ehtimal paylanmasının əldə olunması [Extracting risk-neutral probability distribution from Brent oil options]," MPRA Paper 65704, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Christodoulakis, George, 2020. "Estimating the term structure of commodity market preferences," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 282(3), pages 1146-1163.
    5. Smith, Tom, 2012. "Option-implied probability distributions for future inflation," Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, Bank of England, vol. 52(3), pages 224-234.
    6. Hackworth, Christopher & Radia, Amar & Roberts, Nyssa, 2013. "Understanding the MPC’s forecast performance since mid-2010," Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin, Bank of England, vol. 53(4), pages 336-350.
    7. Chen, Yan, 2021. "Evaluating the influence of energy prices on tight oil supply with implications on the impacts of COVID-19," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).

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