The U.S. dollar has jumped to its strongest level in nearly a year, raising questions about how a strong greenback could act as a drag on debt and oil demand in much of the world. The U.S. Federal Reserve announced another rate hike a few days ago, which helped edge up the dollar to a new high for the year.

Geopolitics has taken over the oil market, driving oil prices up to three-year highs. The inventory surplus has vanished, and more outages could push oil prices up even higher. Yet, there are some signs that demand is starting to take a hit as oil closes in on $80 per barrel.

Oil prices fell back suddenly over the last few trading sessions, dragged down by some forces beyond the oil market.

Echoing the criticism of too much hype surrounding U.S. shale from the Saudi oil minister last week, a new report finds that shale drilling is still largely not profitable. Not only that, but costs are on the rise and drillers are pursuing "irrational production."

The U.S. shale industry might have just received a huge windfall with the nine-month extension of the OPEC cuts.

U.S. oil inventories are at record levels, but there are a few glimmers of hope that the glut could be starting to subside.

Crude oil prices are probably already high enough to spark a rebound in shale production. The IEA says that in the third quarter of 2016, the U.S. shale industry became cash flow neutral for the first time ever. That isn’t a typo. For years, the drilling boom was done with a lot of debt, and the revenues earned from steadily higher levels of output were not enough to cover the cost of drilling, even when oil prices traded above $100 per barrel in the go-go drilling days between 2011 and 2014.

Another oil price downturn threatens to deepen the plunging levels of investment in upstream oil and gas production, which could create a more acute price spike in the years ahead.