A flood of new events regarding Detroit bailouts and possible market failures has caused oil futures to fall below $40 a barrel for the first time in four years, settling at a low $36.22 a barrel Thursday.

Marking a 60% loss year-to-date, oil falling has provided hope for the lower class consumers, and provided a strong metric of a readjusting economic crisis across the entire market.

OPEC announced this week they would be cutting production by another 2.2 million barrels per day, but OPEC’s control over market prices through monopolistic tactics is limited by the stronger forces clearly pushing prices downward. The last few cuts have been accompanied by correlative (but nonsensical) indications of dramatically falling crude oil prices.

OPEC President Chakib Kheilil said they were aiming for a price of $70 - $80 a barrel, a price that he says is a “fair price,” and a price that is significantly under the $200 a barrel Kheilil was expecting earlier this year.

OPEC revealed there has been a possible less-than 80% compliance with their demands for the supporting nations to reduce oil supply, though, Saudi Arabia is cited as taking the bulk of OPEC production level cuts.

Dow Jones Industrial Average fell about 200 points in the same day.

The oil options and futures market is contracting at a rate never seen in the past, with many options expiring Friday, the market could be seen to decline once again.

European and Asian stocks remain remarkably stable.

JP Morgan analysts told Forbes they expect a natural contraction of 1 million barrels of oil demanded per day in 2009.

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