[sammyg2]

It's all about speculation.
The demand is off a little but not that much. The supply hasn't changed much, the difference between $145 and $45 is the investors who were gobbling up the futures in order to drive the price up further, which they did for a while.

Oil producers ramped up a little overt the last year, demand fell a little, which was enough to convince the investors to go elsewhere. With no speculators around to artificially drive the price up, it fell. It fell so much in fact that is scared everyone away from that market and now it's artificially lower than it should be. It will stabilize at around $75 eventually.
The damger is that the refineries are selling gas significantly cheaper than it costs to make it right now. If that continues, they will start going away. Then when the summer driving season starts up and people increase the demand, there won't be enough capacity to keep up. It takes a long time to re-commission a moth-balled refinery and staff up with qualified people.
Temporary supply shortages, skyrocketing prices, rationing, not what our economy needs.