An Analysis of Oil Prices Considering the Political Risk of OPEC

Oil price wild fluctuations impact the economies of developing countries as well as those of developed ones. Focusing on OPEC’s political risks as a proxy of precautionary demand, this study aims to disentangle oil price factors using an SVAR approach for 1994Q1 to 2016Q4. We disentangled oil price shocks into political risks, supplies, global demand for industrial goods and other oil price shocks. Our results highlight that shocks originated from different sources affect oil prices differently in terms of both their lifetime and directions. Besides, it is revealed that the structure of oil market has changed due to the 2008 financial crisis, increased oil price fluctuations, changes in OPEC’s behaviour and accordingly its market power, and the advent of new shale oil technologies, thus affecting oil price sensitivities. Therefore, we found out that OPEC’s political risks affected oil markets way more significantly in 2008-2016.