He should read this blog, or ZeroHedge, or OilPrice. Here’s a 10-point cheat sheet.
We Have a Spike in Oil Prices I Don’t Understand
“We have a spike in oil prices today that I don’t really understand.”
A Handy Suggestion
Oil Cheat Sheet for Bessent
- Oil and diesel prices are global.
- The strait is not open. The strait was open before Trump started this idiotic war.
- Diesel is rising more than oil or gasoline due to refining capacity issues.
- Ukraine has knocked out much of Russia’s refining capacity.
- Russia was a big exporter of diesel but now has export bans.
- US diesel exports are at record highs.
- Repeat after me, the US is not immune to global price shocks. We are not energy independent as Trump claims.
- Treasury yield manipulations will not fix the oil markets.
- Treasury yield manipulations will not fix a spending problem in Congress either.
- Treasury yields are rising due to oil price inflation, tariff-sponsored inflation, rising deficits, and inane Trump economic policies in general.
One might have thought that a US Treasury Secretary would understand this.
Then again.
Requirement for the Job
A requirement for working for Trump is belief in every idiotic thing he says or does, no matter how stupid or contradictory.
Actually, that is the only requirement.
Once you understand the one requirement for working under Trump, you understand why Bessent has to say he does not understand why oil prices are rising, even if he does.
Q. Does Bessent understand?
A: What does it matter?
All This Science I Don’t Understand
And all this science, I don’t understand.
It’s just my job five days a week.
Spotlight on Understanding
It’s not Bessent’s job to understand. More accurately, it’s his job to not understand.
For everybody else, to understand in detail why diesel is rising much faster than the price of gasoline, please see US Diesel Crack Surpasses $100 a Barrel for the First Time, Farmers Suffer
Record high crack spreads. Serious economic ramifications.
Related Posts
August 14, 2026: Trump Says “I’ll Never Apologize, You’re Just Paying a Tiny Bit More”
Trump just handed the Democrats another midterm election talking point.
August 19, 2026: Debt topped $40 trillion today. But let’s discuss what really matters.
What market manipulation is next? Diesel crack spreads?
August 20, 2026: Good Morning Farmers. Diesel Is Only 27 Cents from a Record High
And crude is soaring again so Diesel rates to jump again tomorrow.
Between Bessent admitting he doesn’t know the first thing about his job and Darline Graham admitting she doesn’t know squat about national security. I’m really starting to see more honesty from the GOP that they are in fact total morons who pander to literal booger eaters with stories about spooky trans’d kids and marauding Mexican banditos.
Y’know, I was reading Finviz earlier and came across this very “special” individual’s blog.
https://www.capitalflowsresearch.com/p/how-bessent-is-establishing-a-new
I think this is a great summary of what Trump, Bessent, and all his retarded cronies think. In fact, they’re pretty much openly saying it: The free market is bad because China. Never mind that China currently has more internal competition in their economy than the too big to fail model of the USSA. No no, we have to turn into a fascist command economy to compete you see! We have to manipulate bonds or else China wins.
This is all a brilliant counterattack to China!
A favorite quote of mine from said short bus writing:
How could we all not see?? It’s the Hyperliquid in the toilet that will save us! Brought to you by the same minds that proclaimed injecting bleach cures COVID and all men should take
HRTtestosterone to become more manly.Fair competition is for suckers. Smart people prefer games that are rigged in their favor.
I’d call them good shucksters but the problem is that a good shuckster knows when to leave town before people clue in. You generally don’t buy a mansion in a town full of angry suckers and losers.
US says it caused dollar shortage to trigger Iran protests: What that meansIn a stunning admission, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Washington engineered a dollar shortage to send the Iranian rial into freefall that culminated with protesters taking to the streets
https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2026/2/13/us-says-it-caused-dollar-shortage-to-trigger-iran-protests-what-that-means
If we think diesel prices are high now?
Just wait until Canada puts export fees on its crude or there is a hurricane in the gulf.
At some point, I think panic buying will set in and that’s what will cause a huge melt up then meltdown. I suspect when diesel hits $7 or $8 is what will trigger it and I think it happens before December.
Got calls? puts? long/short/sideways hedges?
Just stopped by to issue a 3-star Mishelin award. Keep it up Mish!
Oh and to remind everyone…
Do worry, Trump, Walrus, GOP, and democrats will find a way to make things even worse.™
Bessent’s face brings to mind the saying “Wrecked him? It nearly killed him!”
Quibble:
Ukraine hasn’t knocked out any of Russia’s refining capacity. The CIA and MI6 have.
So Russia, with its vaunted KGB/FSB apparatus, has lost 40% of its diesel refining capacity due to the CIA?
I think you need a couple more layers of tinfoil on your propeller beanie.
the market believed the US story that “shadow fleets” were passing through Hormuz at night until it became an obvious lie
I think the traders on Wall Street have a right-leaning worldview. It gives them a particular susceptibility to Trump’s pronouncements.
Reality eventually intrudes.
This post is very much on the mark. The Trump administration is in effect a grand coalition between morons (exemplified by Trump himself or Hegseth) and phonies (exemplified by JD Vance or Marco Rubio). Bessent is solidly in the phonies camp. He knows exactly why oil prices have surged again, but he needs to pretend that he doesn’t know, otherwise the morons are mad (or worse) at him.
Bessent’s boss thinks it’s possible to jawbone rates and prices to where they want them to go, and sometimes it works.
Bessent can’t point out the elephants in the room like Mish just did. Boss would get mad.
Bessent lent a veneer of financial acumen to this administration. That is in tatters. He is impotently leaking tepid air on everything now, like a punctured old tire. He is damaged goods. (Thinking of Colin Powell in the W. Bush admin.)
Maybe Bessent is so much inside the Trump fishbowl that he truly can’t understand things as obvious as this. People have remarked that Trump has a formidable reality distortion field,like Jobs or Elon. Trump’s hasn’t worked on me for one second, ever. But I don’t have that proximity, because I am not that stupid or weak. But I am constantly astounded at what my fellows will swallow, just blank out on, or belligerently defend.
That means there are trading opportunities.
Bessant is about as bright as a dark night.
He strikes me as the sort to walk outside at night, stare at the ground, and wonder why he can’t see the sun on the other side of the planet. Either that or he thinks the earth is flat. Either or.
Bessent Says He Doesn’t Understand Oil Prices? Bessent knows Trump signed a MOU with Iran —but Trump quickly showed no intention of following any parts of that Agreement? DUH!
He might want to research a concept known as Supply and Demand, which if understood might explain this strange phenomenon of oil price increases
Pretty simple, depress supply, price goes up. Add risk to supply, price goes up. This guy and frankly most in the Trump administration make the 3 stooges look competent.
Apparently, he doesn’t know much about the US Treasury bond market either.
It’s really quite simple. Oil tankers don’t want to get blown out of the water by traveling the ‘safe’ Straight of Hormuz.
The Iranians are right, the Trump admin is a clown car
I could have told you that!!!