Oil is a commodity and as described by you that transaction wouldn’t be a security. However, the way you frame it:
>There's no underlying business that's being invested in or paying dividends to you.
>You don't own shares in his company.
You make it sound that only equity/shares are securities, which isn’t the standard.
>It's 100% a speculation on appreciation.
While there is massive speculation, that’s not the standard either, and I don’t think your factual conclusion is accurate either. The investors are relying on the efforts of others for their profits. The article you link concludes Ether isn’t a security because the investors aren’t relying on the issuer/promoter rather 3rd party developers. But case law doesn’t limit the reliance to the promoter it specifically uses the word “others”, but even so, I think it’s easily argued investors are relying on the foundation to bring 3rd party developers to the table.
At the end of the day...the SEC could have done a Howey analysis on Ether itself, which in my opinion would have been much more interesting and informative than the SEC retroactively doing an analysis on the DAO.