Effects of Covid-19 on Crude Oil Price and Future Forecast Using a Model Application and Machine Learning

Oil Price has been a benchmark governing the trade of oil and gas globally. It is fixed by producing countries or countries in a consortium through organizations such as Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) or a particular mix of crude oil such as the West Texas Intermediate (WTI) or Brent. The spot price and future prices of crude oil is basically determined by demand and supply, however, some external factors can have great influence on oil price. This research work will be emphasizing on the direct and indirect effects of the COVID-19 pandemic as an external factor other than demand and supply on the benchmarks of oil pricing between 2000 and 2020. Having analyzed the various oil price fluctuation which have been caused by several factors over the years, this research went further to identify those significant factors, weigh them and input them into a model that will generate simulated oil prices of past, present and future benchmarks with relation to demand, supply, production cost and other external factors. This model was also validated using machine learning algorithms and real data of previous yearly average oil price noting the reasons for each spot price. Significant recommendations were made on the use of this model for fixing oil price benchmarks as variables to each benchmark are numerous.