A day for the history books - oil's crash
Oil's front month contract crashed below zero. This may be considered "historic" in some ways (never before has oil fallen below zero), but other contracts aren't showing the same insane drop. Regardless, this has pushed many indicators related to oil to record-breaking extremes.
For example, here's crude oil's term structure at a record high:
The number of media stories mentioning "oil zero" is at an all-time high, higher than what we saw during the 2008 oil crash:
Here's the 10 day realized volatility for WTI oil's front month contract:
And here's oil's VIX, also at an all-time high:
The recent divergence between commodities vs. stocks and incredibly weak economic data has many in the media noting the wide divergence between the economy and stock market. In a way, this is the market expecting that the worst is already over (i.e. the rate of deterioration is slowing down). That hasn't stopped the Citigroup Economic Surprise Index from falling to one of the lowest levels ever.
The only other time the Economic Surprise Index was this low was in December 2008. Back then, the S&P fell further in the next few months before staging a major rally:
As for oil, USO fell further over the next few months before rallying: