Everyone is guessing when it comes to oil prices

PREDICTING and diagnosing the trajectory of oil prices has become something of a cottage industry in the past year. But along with all of the excess crude flowing from the oil patch, there is also an abundance of market indicators that while important, tend to produce a lot of noise that makes any accurate estimate nearly impossible.

First there is the oil price itself. The crash began last summer, and accelerated in November. Since then, predictions for oil prices for 2015 have been all over the map - from Citigroup's US$20 per barrel, to T Boone Pickens' prediction of a return to US$100 per barrel. Opec's secretary-general even said prices could…