CNBC just hosted oil magnate T. Boone Pickens this morning in a sit down interview with Becky Quick.  Now that his $125 target on oil has been hit, he’s making a new prediction on oil prices.  He said oil prices are continuing to go up as 85 million barrels per day is as good as supply can get and 87 million barrels per day is the demand.  He also said the president wasted his time going to Saudi Arabia asking for more oil.

Pickens just said he thinks oil could and will likely go to $150 per barrel this year, and that will translate to a deficit spending in the U.S. of $900 Billion rather than $600 Billion at $100 oil.  As far as the old joke of $80 before he’s 80, he did joke about $160 before he’s 160 years old.

Pickens said natural gas is the one oil replacement we have and he also noted that ethanol is a joke and can only max out at about 6%.  He noted that these oil and gas exploration companies have made significant finds in natural gas:

• El Paso Corp. (NYSE: EP)
• SandRidge Energy, Inc. (NYSE: SD)
• EXCO Resources Inc. (NYSE: XCO)

Of course he also noted wind energy, but noted solar too.  Becky asked him about his Clean Energy (NASDAQ: CLNE) company and he even dismissed that noting this was much bigger than his company.

This was a totally off-oil topic piece, but may be of interest as well.  As far as his opinion on Carl Icahn going into Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), he said he followed him into the stock and he owns 10 Million shares of Yahoo! now too.

Elsewhere in the oil patch:

• Goldman Sachs recently took their target to $141 per barrel.
• UBS also hiked their targets as well.
• The Saudis agreed to increase production, slightly.

Jon C. Ogg
May 20, 2008

Jon Ogg produces and edits the "10 Stocks Under $10" newsletter and he does not own securities in the companies he covers.

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