Hi Chasleo,

These are both good observations that are definitely worth a discussion.

As far as Israel carrying out a test of bombing Iran I think that many both in and out of the market feel that this is a precursor to an actual military strike. As Israel has made similar strikes in the past I think most also feel that they are most likely not bluffing here and that if Iran does not halt what Israel considers to be activity aimed at building a nuclear bomb, then they will bomb those facilities.
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When you combine the seriousness of this with the fact that the oil markets are already on edge over pretty much everything and you can see why oil would move on an announcement such as this.

The think that I feel it is important to remember about the markets is that the markets anticipate news so generally if the outcome of a particular event is as the market was expecting it to be then the market will not move. If however the outcome of a particular event is different than was expected and the market considers that even important, then the market will generally move as a result.

From what I have seen so far the only real difference that came out of this meeting that the market was not already expecting was that the Saudi's said that they may increase production over and above the extra 200,000 barrels per day that the market was already expecting.

So, theoretically you could see the market sell off as a result of this but in my opinion this was not a major deviation from what the market was expecting so the market may not move at all as a result of that.

Hope that helps. Please feel free to post any other questions or comments.

Best Regards,
Dave