On Monday evening, the impact of the coronavirus pandemic hit the oil industry and it hit hard. The price of an oil barrel plummeted to an all-time low in history.

The cost of crude oil went down to less than $0 per barrel and people took to Twitter to share their reactions and confusion on the negative prices.

BREAKING: Oil drops below $1 a barrel https://t.co/eKd7HuZjow pic.twitter.com/bk0uPFlupN

— Bloomberg (@business) April 20, 2020

The epidemiologists breath a sigh of relief as everyone on Twitter transforms into an oil economist instead.

— James O'Malley (@Psythor) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/amandamull/status/1252296358570098696

Iconic chart.
Too bad it's not because of climate change measures https://t.co/NmERBEMQRT

— Maarten Lambrechts @[email protected] (@maartenzam) April 20, 2020

[totally understanding how markets work] Yeah uh let me get ᶠᵒᵘʳ ᵒᶦˡˢ

— Jeremy Gordon (@jeremypgordon) April 20, 2020

Oil is the old data.

— Björn Jeffery (@bjornjeffery) April 21, 2020

https://twitter.com/matvelloso/status/1252301886008422400

lot more of you than i expected talkin bout oil prices

— Charlie Warzel (@cwarzel) April 20, 2020

So America destroyed the middle east for oil, thousands and thousands people have been killed in the endless wars and now the price of oil is tanking? #OilPrice https://t.co/jdYC0g2Sow

— 👀 (@Anxious_Matt) April 20, 2020

it's almost as if we just make up how much things cost

— Gene Park (@GenePark) April 20, 2020

Call me when OLIVE oil is under $2 a barrel

— Adam Serwer 🍝 (@AdamSerwer) April 20, 2020

Oil is the new data pic.twitter.com/BHJgCINpw7

— Alex Selby-Boothroyd (@AlexSelbyB) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/DanielleAlberti/status/1252295444555857921

finally 👏🏻 someone 👏🏻 said 👏🏻 it 👏🏻 https://t.co/Tj0r2QBTB4

— Ryan Broderick (@broderick) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/TonyRomm/status/1252299695717863424

https://twitter.com/neonwario/status/1252341447468019715

Gonna tell my kids I was alive when oil hit $0

— . (@sohanvd) April 20, 2020

#OilPrice pic.twitter.com/gKNnf4M4jP

— jurídico paul thomas anderson (@moarajuliana) April 20, 2020

The next stimulus payout will be sent to you in the form of 80 barrels of oil.

— Kate Hyde (@KateHydeNY) April 20, 2020

these are our political cartoons of our time. It’s genius https://t.co/RfFLPd1kBB

— Gene Park (@GenePark) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/gaytransistor/status/1252299912001343488

https://twitter.com/HalpernAlex/status/1252301275963682818

https://twitter.com/gaytransistor/status/1252299912001343488

I bought my wife a barrel of oil for our anniversary months in advance and now i look like a fucking moron

— computer man (@gloomfather) April 20, 2020

Why has US #OilPrice dropped below $0?

– No cars, no planes, no ships, no factories so demand for oil is cataclysmically low
– There is excess supply and storage space is running out.
-Oil producers are paying buyers to take the oil off their hands as it's cheaper than storing. pic.twitter.com/HhvXgKPk1f

— EdGenie (@EdGenieUK) April 20, 2020

how to buy oil stock

— Gene Park (@GenePark) April 20, 2020

Oil is absolutely collapsing. If you aren’t paying attention you should be. #CNBC #OilPrice pic.twitter.com/goeOUqREvg

— Ryan (@ExpiredOvaltine) April 20, 2020

The plan? Sell more oil by making it so cheap that we’ll pay people to buy it https://t.co/R2TgfZm94k pic.twitter.com/Q69Ff6gOJ7

— Jules (@Julian_Epp) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/rmdbutler/status/1252301261304709122

The May futures contract price went negative, because of a lack of buyers. If they can't unload those contracts by tomorrow, they must take delivery. Speculators never planed to take delivery… so they're panicking. WTI crude is actually trading around $22 #OilPrice

— Veteran Market Timer (@3Xtraders) April 20, 2020

anyone find it really difficult to focus and do work when there's free oil out there

— Gene Park (@GenePark) April 20, 2020

OIL IS FREE https://t.co/q7FNUMPJz0

— Azfir (@Azfarovski) April 20, 2020

Good move if you went with Animal Crossing https://t.co/f75CjpuFz5

— Businessweek (@BW) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/econinbricks/status/1252302118234488833

just to be clear, i also absolutely understand how oil prices work and what it means—shocking stuff (that i have a firm grasp of)

— Ashley Feinberg (ashleyfeinberg.bsky.social) (@ashleyfeinberg) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/JasonAbbruzzese/status/1252300426684309504

https://twitter.com/AlexJamesFitz/status/1252303188407050250

https://twitter.com/AlexJamesFitz/status/1252310307470483457

genuine question: can anybody explains what it actually means when oil prices go negative?

— Steven Rich (@dataeditor) April 20, 2020

Negative oil prices don’t really mean oil is valueless. They mean, at least in theory, that the cost of shutting down a well exceeds the cost of paying people to take oil off your hands.

— Robinson Meyer (@robinsonmeyer) April 20, 2020

okay I mean a deal is a deal I'm the market for 100 barrels of oil, please DM me if you're selling

— Emanuel Maiberg (@emanuelmaiberg) April 20, 2020

This was hilarious

Oil going to start an onlyfans soon

— Luka Donthičć (@landahoy14) April 20, 2020

"Oil prices below $0"

Oil industry right now:#OilPrice https://t.co/4edjuFlXGx

— 𝐣𝐚𝐜𝐤 🦋 (@imchained2katy) April 20, 2020

The #OilPrice closed at MINUS $37 today.

These tweets NEVER age oil well. https://t.co/a5TuSyjRyH

— BrooklynDad_Defiant!☮️ (@mmpadellan) April 20, 2020

oil is just as valuable as tweets now https://t.co/0VeCvOtxGT

— Gene Park (@GenePark) April 20, 2020

America looking at the trillions it has spent in war only to have oil cost less than a bottle of Coke!
😂😂😂 #OilPrice pic.twitter.com/No89iZm7Pp

— Dania Shabbir (@DANIA_SHABBIR) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/nightwarning/status/1252301012049821704

On 4/20 Oil is $0.69 a barrel. We did it folks. We did it. pic.twitter.com/rnzCXwKIoh

— Duncan (@dunkman) April 20, 2020

Oil at the moment pic.twitter.com/djYlUhU7UY

— Danny Makki (@danny_makki) April 20, 2020

US crude oil futures fall below $0 for the first time in history.
Unbelievebable.

Btw Who did this 😅#OilCrash #OilPrice pic.twitter.com/hQB8uLU32K

— AThar 🍂 (@Leo__weirdo) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/DfwSter/status/1252311554877521921

https://twitter.com/thor_benson/status/1252300374352056322

https://twitter.com/matvelloso/status/1252456470462951424

I’ll buy a full tanker load of your finest crude oil, keep the change.#oilprice #OilPrices pic.twitter.com/TnTmcYOh2X

— Resh @m! (@resh_ami) April 20, 2020

Me having dinner with JayZ after I buy 1 dollar worth of oil and become an oil baron #OilPrice pic.twitter.com/t6OckpZoLu

— Big Protein (@KingSlimeV3) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/KT_So_It_Goes/status/1252300835570307074

I second this tweet https://t.co/IZZX1KTvAx

— Sally Shin (@sallyshin) April 21, 2020

https://twitter.com/frankpallotta/status/1252387368482467848

https://twitter.com/WordWithBird/status/1252314430207135745

https://twitter.com/breadandposes/status/1252300652920950784

Trump's oil advisers right now explaining things to him #OilPrice pic.twitter.com/opOGha7LOv

— KingDead (@KingDeadWolf) April 20, 2020

The #OilPrice closed at MINUS $37 today.

These tweets NEVER age oil well. https://t.co/a5TuSyjRyH

— BrooklynDad_Defiant!☮️ (@mmpadellan) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/CamdenRaynor/status/1252305668478025731

Me and the boys waiting for the V-shaped recovery pic.twitter.com/hW60fiLx8K

— Colin Mortimer (@colinmort) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/JasonAbbruzzese/status/1252286962318413825

$17.99.

I’m not proud of doing this and I wouldn’t quote these numbers. But the EIA estimates that US onshore wind is about $0.035 per kilowatt-hour. And EIA data suggests a barrel of 2020 US crude, in real-world US power plants, could generate 514 kWh. So, a wind barrel is $18. https://t.co/hdknT23OeY

— Robinson Meyer (@robinsonmeyer) April 20, 2020

THREAD EXPLAINING NEGATIVE OIL:

Oil costs $ to store. Due to the economic collapse, oil isn't being used much. So all the storage facilities are filled up. So nobody who can store it will buy it from you. If you want to get rid of oil, you have to pay someone.

That's the thread

— Joe Weisenthal (@TheStalwart) April 20, 2020

The plan: Get rid of excess oil by turning the price negative (after discount) pic.twitter.com/t3pLDBjAJX

— Alex Kantrowitz (@Kantrowitz) April 20, 2020

Six days ago. https://t.co/QhVaVjJTKn

— Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) April 20, 2020

https://twitter.com/darth/status/1252300485802901505

new idea to save media: turn open plan media offices into oil storage warehouses https://t.co/0AyNQ7xpcz

— Max Tani (@maxwelltani) April 20, 2020

this oil price crash is quite something – Jefferies analyst Jason Gammel calling it “the bleakest oil macro outlook since at least the late 1990s and perhaps ever”. The WTI contract for May delivery was down 31.4 per cent at $12.53 https://t.co/4Yhhkbl4lp pic.twitter.com/p98qnygqRf

— Tony Tassell (@TonyTassell) April 20, 2020