Global oil market

As global commodities, oil and petroleum products (including gasoline and diesel) are subject to the price swings in free markets and can be influenced by perceptions about future supply and demand. 

• Global oil demand declined in 2009 for the second consecutive year — for the first time since 1983 — averaging approximately 84 million barrels per day.  In addition, U.S. liquid fuels consumption declined last year by about 800,000 barrels per day, or 4.2 percent, to 18.7 million barrels per day.
• ExxonMobil is the largest non-government owned company in the energy industry — yet we produce only about 3 percent of the world's oil and less than 2 percent of the world's energy.
• Per the U.S. Department of Energy, crude oil prices (WTI) averaged about $62 a barrel in 2009, 38 percent lower than the full-year 2008 average price of nearly $100 per barrel.  From October to December 2009, the WTI crude oil price averaged $76 per barrel.