U.S. West Texas Intermediate Crude Oil futures are set to finish lower for the third straight week. What began as a simple pullback in a prolonged uptrend is rapidly becoming a sell-off controlled by factors outside the realm of the traditional fundamentals. Oil traders usually have the tools to control specific risk or diversifiable risk. This is the type of uncertainty that arises with the commodity you invest in. This unsystematic risk is usually reduced through diversification. When unsystematic risk arises for typical crude oil investors, they have several choices including taking profits, moving stops to protect profits, or spreading their positions with other futures contracts. There is no panic and usually the process is orderly. In the case of crude oil, investors started to book profits when uncertainty developed over whether there would be a supply shortage. Crude oil prices rallied over $13 per barrel from late August […]