Oil Hits $100, Sinners Advised To Repent

Drudge busted out the siren for the occasion, but let's try to keep things in perspective.  Front month crude futures did take a nice leap today, moving up 3% on news of Nigerian strife and Mexican port closures.

Still, at $99.36 per barrel (down from a single tick at precisely $100.00), prices are essentially flat from their November highs and still shy of their inflation-adjusted all-time highs set in 1980 (give or take a couple bucks, depending on the inflation calculation).  Trading volume among oil futures also soared, suggesting a move predicated increasingly on speculative fury than on shifting market fundamentals.

Still, the news didn't do much buoy an already morose Wall Street, which rang in the new year with a 200-point intraday plunge for the Dow (and similar declines among the other major indices).