Roil Markets. Be Alan Greenspan for the Day.

By Paul Kedrosky · Thursday, May 31, 2007 ·
Apparently you don't have to be Alan Greenspan to spout stuff and roil world markets. I missed this story until now, but a Tulsa CBS affiliate's website contained an erroneous article about an Oklahoma refinery fire yesterday -- which immediately caused U.S. oil prices to spike by $0.40.

Impressive, but certainly something that will give cheer to an emerging cadre of stockhackers. You will see more people trying this sort of thing going forward, and it won't just be Engadget and a Tulsa television station that get caught up.
World oil prices jumped briefly on Wednesday after a television station in Tulsa, Oklahoma -- the No. 62 U.S. media market -- posted an erroneous story about a refinery fire on its Web site.

At 10:14 EDT, CBS affiliate KOTV reported that a lightning strike had caused a fire at an Oklahoma refinery -- sparking a flurry of excitement among energy traders and boosting U.S. crude prices 40 cents.

The refining company announced the story was "completely wrong" and the station withdrew the story.
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"All it takes is a screw-up on a Web site to move the market. It just goes to show how tense this market is," said a Houston-based oil trader.
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