VENTURE CAPITAL POST

The oil price in the global market continued to skid further on Wednesday touching a new low since March 2009 while crude inventories in the US are increasing.

A year on from the start of one of the biggest oil price crashes in history, the driving force behind the slide remains intact: there is still too much crude.

The drop in big oil companies' profits in the past eight months isn't just a function of lower crude prices – it also reflects strategic choices.

OPEC will not take sole responsibility for propping up the oil price, Saudi Arabia's oil minister said on Sunday, signaling the world's top petroleum exporter is determined to ride out a market slump that has roughly halved prices since last June.

Plunging oil prices have sparked a big rally in Asian government bond markets as lower fuel costs cut inflation expectations, but the rally could be built on shallow foundations as monetary policymakers remain out of step with tumbling bond yields.

Sliding oil prices and a downbeat China factory survey weighed on Asian shares on Tuesday, while the ruble jumped against the dollar after Russia sharply increased its benchmark interest rate in a bid to halt a collapse in its currency.

Venezuela's 2015 budget will be based on a target oil price of $60 dollars per barrel, President Nicolas Maduro said on Friday night, but he repeated expectations that prices will recover.