In the course of 1999 and 2000, however, the oil price rose by almost 300% from the lower limit of this bandwidth to over 37 euros. Since late 2000, oil prices have come down under the impact of global economic slowdown. But a possible war against Iraq might push them up again.
The second shock was caused by the bursting of the ICT stock market bubble. Share prices of ICT companies took a plunge from the peak reached in March 2000, losing two-thirds of their value. ICT investments - which in the US had risen by 10% to 20% every year since the early 1990s - have been falling since mid-2000.