Hiding in Plain Sight in the Name of 'Transparency'

Like so many others in California, I have been bugged about the recent spike in prices at the gas pump... To put this in perspective, this was what I paid recently at a nearby Costco for premium. Trust me when I say: It was a bargain. I don't need to go to Costco to save […] Not rendering correctly? View this e-mail as a web page [here](. [Empire Financial Daily] Hiding in Plain Sight in the Name of 'Transparency' By Herb Greenberg --------------------------------------------------------------- [A radical fifth shock to the dollar is coming...]( In economic history, there have been four major events which have shaped America and the economies of the world... The fifth could occur on December 3. And every American (including YOU) stands to be impacted. [Click here for the full story](. --------------------------------------------------------------- Like so many others in California, I have been bugged about the recent spike in prices at the gas pump... To put this in perspective, this was what I paid recently at a nearby Costco for premium. Trust me when I say: It was a bargain. I don't need to go to Costco to save a few pennies on gas. But when I'm saving $0.50 to $1 per gallon, that starts to add up... and the principled "value oriented" part of me kicks in. Now, before we go further, let me make something clear... I love living in California, I'm a centrist, and if you want to hurl your anti-California or anti-centrist rhetoric my way, don't waste your time. If that's a problem, please don't read further and have a great day... and I hope to see you when we return to our regularly scheduled programming. If you're OK with that, read on... --------------------------------------------------------------- Recommended Link: [The only money-making acronym you need to know for 2023]( Soon, the acronym "PVAB" could be as commonplace as "ASAP" or "TGIF." But if you don't know it yet, you're not too late... By the time it fully rolls out, PVAB will have a bigger lasting impact on our society than the Internet. That's why some of the biggest names in the business – from Bill Gates to Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk – are pumping billions into it. To see how you can get massive returns from what could well be the biggest investment opportunity of this year, [click here now](. --------------------------------------------------------------- Gas prices here in California are always higher than everywhere else... But in the past few weeks, they have gone nuts. Even as gas prices have been rising around the country, the gap this time between here and everywhere else is egregious. To put this in perspective, AAA says the average price for a gallon nationwide today is $3.81. In California, it's $6.06. In San Diego, where I live, my trusty GasBuddy app had shown a $1 spread of $6.09 to $7.09 for a gallon of premium when I went to fill up, depending on the station. (That itself is crazy, but I digress...) When $6 per gallon one week and $6.09 per gallon the next is a bargain, I say, 'Houston, we have a problem'... I checked the local press, or what's left of it, and I didn't see anything compelling. Then I did a quick Google search and there it was – something merely mentioned in press reports... The California Energy Commission's Division of Petroleum Market Oversight – created by the California Gas Price Gouging & Transparency Law – recently sent a letter to the governor and legislature saying that the rise in prices appears to have been driven, in part, by "an unusual transaction on the gasoline spot market." As the statement went on to say (emphasis added)... An unusual transaction took place on the California spot market on Friday, September 15, that caused the market price of gasoline to increase by nearly $0.50 per gallon, which ultimately gets passed onto consumers. Following engagement with market participants, we observed spot market prices stabilize, fall briefly, and then increase again; the consequences of this volatility will be felt at the pump for some time. It is not an exaggeration to say that one trade likely cost California drivers many millions of dollars at the pump. Let's get this straight... "An unusual transaction..."? "Following engagement with market participants..."? "It's not an exaggeration to say..."? I may no longer formally be a journalist, but I like to think I still have a few of the instincts that served me so well... Those instincts are screaming: Wait, what? Real transparency isn't merely saying there is an 'unusual market transaction'... Giving detail on what that transaction involved would be. And if the government doesn't know, somebody does. Maybe I'm reading more into it than there really is. I very well may be too cynical for my own good. After all, I'm merely opining here, not reporting. But opining is sometimes how good reporting starts... And I'm old enough to remember a little more than 20 years ago when California's "power crisis" was traced to a bunch of unusual transactions involving energy trading by Enron. Back then, Enron created an artificial crisis via artificial electricity shortages... using such techniques known as "megawatt laundering," and strategies internally called such things as "death star" and "get shorty." Just as the energy shortages then didn't make any sense, neither does do the spiraling gas prices today... And the only thing we know is that there was an "unusual market transaction" in the country's most populated state, which also ranks as one of the world's largest economies. I mentioned the Enron connection on social media and someone I know joked... This is an interesting thought, you dinosaur. He's right, and dinosaurs have a great sense of history. Somehow, this "unusual market transaction" has fallen through the cracks of national press coverage. At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist, what I know is this: There's more to this story and somebody will figure it out... and it's likely to be a doozy. And speaking of energy... My colleagues Whitney Tilson and Gabe Marshank have released the latest edition of their Energy Supercycle Investor newsletter. In it, they're covering a big opportunity in a corner of the energy market that many people know but few have studied. As they put it... This sector has quietly been a bedrock of the energy space for the better part of a century – and responsible for $60 billion in output and a half million jobs in the U.S. alone. But folks almost never stop to think about it these days. This is ironic, because throughout most of its history, it has been cloaked in controversy. That has led to a public opinion that has nothing to do with its fundamentals... which has led to apathy... which has created an astonishing investment opportunity today. As such, they just recommended seven stocks for the Energy Supercycle Investor portfolio to take advantage of what they're calling a global, secular shift... [Get the full story here](. Regards, Herb Greenberg October 2, 2023 [Get a 30-day, 100% money-back trial to Empire Real Wealth by clicking here.]( --------------------------------------------------------------- If someone forwarded you this e-mail and you would like to be added to the Empire Financial Daily e-mail list to receive e-mails like this every weekday, simply [sign up here](. © 2023 Empire Financial Research. All rights reserved. Any reproduction, copying, or redistribution, in whole or in part, is prohibited without written permission from Empire Financial Research, 1125 N. 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