Oil market yawns at Obama's oil speech

President Obama spoke this morning in Cushing, Okla., on how his policies are good for the oil industry and America's energy future. How did the oil market react to his speech?

With yawns. Here is today's chart of the Electronically Traded Fund, US Oil (symbol USO):

Oil prices have been dropping for most of this week due mainly to lessening of perceived tensions in the Middle East, Saudi promises to increase their exports and rising inventories of petroleum products.

But the market as a whole had already discounted Obama's speech and so prices didn't budge when he gave it. (As comparison, when Obama announced on March 15 that he would order a release of oil from the US Political Strategic Oil Reserve, prices dropped immediately - but only briefly because the market quickly learned there was no "there" there in Obama's announcement. In less than an hour, prices jumped skyward. See here.)