White House Advisor Urges Discontinuation of Releases from Strategic Petroleum Reserve
July 25, 2022
US crude oil inventories are 6% below the five year average, gasoline inventories are 3% below the five year average, and distillates are 23% below the five year average. Propane inventories are currently 16% below the five year average.
The Baker Hughes Rig Count had oil rigs unchanged on the week at a total of 599. Last year at this time oil rigs were 387 rigs.
Russia is saying that they will not supply crude oil to any country that puts a price cap on its crude oil. This news over the weekend has pushed crude oil price up in early trading to start the week.
In Friday’s energy future market trading ULSD price were down, and gasoline future were up. It had to be traders dealing with spread between the two futures or trading being done on the crack spreads. The one common factor is that volatility remains high.
Libya’s Oil Minister said the country’s oil production is at more than 800,000 bpd and will reach 1.2 million bpd by next month. Traders are hoping that this production will help close the gap between Brent crude oil and WTI crude oil which has widened out to over $8.00 per barrel. US production has seen increases and Europe continue to struggle with supplies and this has helped to push the spread out to over $8 per barrel when it normally trade around $3.00 per barrel.
Yahoo finance has reported that a Biden adviser said that the oil reserve releases need to end, and we have to quit being a supplier to the world with our strategic reserve. The SPR release was a stop-gap measure, said Amos Hochstein, Biden’s Special Presidential Coordinator for International Energy Affairs. It is a reserve and so we have to keep that. He said the ending the release will not spur supply shocks, noting that the private sector has assured him that it will be able to ramp up production once there is no longer access to the reserve.