Companies use secret math to survive global oil shocks

To prevent a repeat of the 1970s, when oil prices quadrupled and caused years of economic pain, the European Central Bank now uses sophisticated math to model 'adverse scenarios.' These simulations run 10,000 different paths to calculate exactly how a conflict in a place like the Strait of Hormuz would ripple through the world. If oil prices spike by just 19 percent, the math predicts a nearly one-point drop in economic growth as the costs pass through to everything from groceries to electricity.