A Brief Recap Of Recent Crude Oil Prices

Crude oil is at levels last seen during the height of the financial crisis, during which the price of oil traded below $50 on its way to the $33.20 low in January 2009, before rebounding over subsequent months to close at $66.40 by May 2009.

Prior to that, crude had last broken the $50 level briefly in January 2007, again rebounding sharply to close at $65.71 three months later. Since March 2005, crude oil on a monthly basis only closed below $50 during the crisis from November 2008 to March 2009.

With crude oil now trading at $48.86, it will be interesting to see how low the price will go before it finds some stability and how powerful the counter-trend rally could be.

The United States Oil Fund LP (ETF) USO traded at $18.50 in Tuesday's premarket, down 1.5 percent.