USA oil boom will not lower prices??

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Oil tanker at the Port of Long Beach, Calif.

The United States is awash in oil, yet analysts at RBC Capital Markets don't expect that to pull benchmark crude prices much lower.

In its five-year outlook, published Thursday, RBC analysts said soaring U.S. production will be absorbed by the rest of the world "with only modest price impact" over the next year. The world's largest economy is churning out record amounts of crude, and is mulling whether to export some of it abroad—something it hasn't done in decades.

Last month, the Energy Information Administration said the U.S. would pump huge amounts of oil and natural gas through at least 2016, with annual crude production challenging the 1970 record of 9.6 million barrels per day.

MIXED ENEGRY PRICES IN 2013

Change in energy prices mixed in 2013 as prices of nonenergy commodities fell

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration based on Bloomberg, L.P.
Note: Price changes are derived by taking the difference in annual average prompt contract price for each commodity for all trading days in 2012 and 2013. This method allows for comparisons of different commodity classes on a consistent basis. PRB Coal is Powder River Basin Coal. CAPP Coal is Central Appalachia Coal. WTI is West Texas Intermediate, a benchmark for both physical and financial crude oil pricing located in Cushing, Oklahoma. RBOB Gasoline is a kind of gasoline based on a reformulated blendstock for oxygenate blending (RBOB).

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During 2013, the prices of various energy commodities increased from 2012 levels or were down modestly as prices of nonenergy commodities generally fell significantly. Prices for natural gas, western coal, electricity, and WTI crude were all higher (on average) in 2013 than in 2012, while the price of North Sea Brent crude oil, various petroleum products, and eastern coal all dropped!