By George Iype
SINGAPORE: Investing legend and commodities guru Jim Rogers says crude oil prices have been going up thanks to an unprecedented demand-supply mismatch. He said those who blame speculators for oil price surge do not understand the oil reality in the world.

Talking to Commodity Online, Rogers, who founded the Rogers International Commodity Index, said he has been predicting all these years that oil price would go up because of shortage of supply.

”Some people blame speculation for oil price rise. If it is speculation, when the oil price is too high, the people with oil will drown the speculators. It is just a stupid accusation that speculators are behind the oil rally,” he said.

He asked: “If people have oil, do you think speculators could have driven the prices too high like this?” “No. People are spreading all speculative stories that speculation is driving up oil prices. That is not correct,” the legendary commodities investor and author of such celebrated books such as Hot Commodities and A Bull in China, said.

He said the truth of the matter is that there is so much shortage of oil in the world. “The shortage of oil in physical market is higher than in the futures market. That is the reason for the high crude oil prices,” he said.

”Those who blame speculators for the high oil prices, I would like to remind them that in futures market every time somebody buys oil, every time the speculators buy oil, the speculators also sell the oil,” Rogers, who is now settled in Singapore said.

He said the US government data says that there are more speculators on the sell side than on the buy side in crude oil market these days”.

”Speculators are getting killed these days; they are loosing money heavily these days. They are selling panicky these days. They are right in selling, because there is no oil to hold on. I wish somebody saves the speculators who are selling. The fact is that there is no oil for delivery and they know that they are not sitting on oil,” Rogers added.