Since the early 1970's there's been a consistent, measurable pattern.



Every boom in the U.S. economy is different, but over the past several decades, each has ended the same way. First you get full employment. Then you get a spike in the price of oil. And then there's a recession.

Oil prices are rarely the only cause of recessions, but they are a critical element.

Only in 1990 and 2018 did the U.S. intentionally cause oil prices to spike.



Crude oil could surge to more than $120 a barrel, according to Bank of America Merill Lynch analysts, if the Trump administration were to order a complete cutoff of Iranian barrels before the end of the year. "Oil is now a game of chicken," the analysts wrote in a note Thursday. They said zero-tolerance sanctions on Iran — the fourth-largest oil producer — could add $50 per barrel to crude prices, which are up more than 25% this year. Brent, the international benchmark, is currently trading at around $77 a barrel.

And Saudi Arabia recently agreed to increase production by two million barrels per day, according to a White House statement. But analysts are skeptical Saudi Arabia will be able to keep up.

"It appears the oil market has little confidence that Iran volumes can be easily replaced," the analysts wrote.

So what does $120 a barrel of oil mean? Simply, recession.



"A combination of global demand strength, OPEC restraint, and geopolitical and sanctions related uncertainty" is pushing oil higher, a team of economists from UBS wrote on Tuesday, arguing that these factors could lead oil to $100 a barrel. The economic consequences of such a move could be huge and could even signal a US recession, the UBS team led by Arend Kapteyn said.

“Your tweets have increased the prices by at least $10. Please stop this method.”

- OPEC Governor Hossein Kazempour Ardebili

This is what we are looking at if Trump gets what he wants.

Iran is threatening to "disrupt oil shipments to neighboring countries" or even much worse.



Mohammad Ali Jafari, the Guards commander, was quoted by the semi-official Tasnim news agency as saying: “We will make the enemy understand that either everyone can use the Strait of Hormuz or no one.”

War in the Strait of Hormuz, even just sinking a couple ships in the strait, would spike oil prices in a way that we've never seen.

China, India and Turkey have refused to commit to Trump's sanctions.

All of this is happening while the yield curve is about to invert, the traditional indicator of a coming recession.

