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An oil rig stands against the setting sun in Midland, Texas on Friday, April 17, 2020. (Odessa American/Eli Hartman)

CATHY BUSSEWITZ – Associated Press – April 20, 2020, 9:19 PM EDT

NEW YORK (AP) — The world is awash in oil, there’s little demand for it and we’re running out of places to put it.

That in a nutshell explains Monday’s strange and unprecedented action in the market for crude oil futures contracts, where traders essentially offered to pay someone else to deal with the oil they were due to have delivered next month.

The price of U.S. benchmark crude that would be delivered in May was selling for around $15 a barrel Monday morning, but fell as low as -$40 per barrel during the day. It was the first time that the price on a futures contract for oil has gone negative, analysts say.

“It’s the worst oil price in history, which shouldn’t surprise us, because it’s the inevitable result of the biggest supply and demand disparity in history,” said Ryan Sitton, commissioner at the Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates the state’s oil industry.

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