Market Commentary
Could Price Decline Cause Shale Producers to Collapse?
June 12, 2020
Crude oil and refined fuel prices fell sharply yesterday by more than 7% along with the US stock market falling by 4% to 5% depending on the index. Prices were under selling pressure as new concerns of an uptick in coronavirus cases in some foreign countries along with Texas, California, […]
Rising Virus Cases Add Fear to Market
June 11, 2020
The DOE reports crude stocks are up 5.72 million barrels to a total of 538.065 million barrels. Last year for this week stocks were at 485.470 million barrels a difference of 52.595 million barrels. This is a record level for crude oil stocks. Gasoline stocks are up 866,000 barrels for […]
International Air Transport Association Expects $84 Billion in Annual Losses
June 10, 2020
The API said the crude oil stocks were up 8.4 million barrels and the estimates for today’s DOE report are for crude to be down 1.7 million barrels. Stocks at Cushing, Ok were down 2.3 million barrels. Gasoline stocks were down 2.9 million barrels and the estimate for today is […]
JP Morgan Raises Brent Crude Forecast Price to $40 per Barrel
June 9, 2020
It appears that the OPEC+ news of extending production cuts was a buy the rumor sell the news event. An extension to production cuts is bullish news but I think the market was disappointed it was only one month and the fact that those making additional voluntary cuts (Saudi Arabia, […]
OPEC+ Extends Production Cuts to End of July
June 8, 2020
OPEC+ agreed to extend the current production cuts of 9.6 million bpd until the end of July over the weekend. They also plan to crack down on those countries that have been the cheaters on their quotas, Nigeria and Iraq. Nigeria and Iraq will have additional quotas for July thru […]
Tropical Storm Cristobal Moves Toward the Gulf of Mexico
June 5, 2020
The Russian Energy Minister said yesterday that crude oil markets in July could see a shortage of 3 to 5 million bpd, according to Interfax, the Russian news agency. I think that may be a bit of a stretch. Compare the Russian outlook with these comments from the shipping industry. […]
US Shale Producers Are Reversing Production Cuts As Prices Rebound
June 3, 2020
The inventory update from the private firm API was released yesterday and it called crude oil supplies down 483,000 barrels. The average estimate for today’s DOE report is for a build of 3 million barrels. The API reported that Cushing, Ok crude oil supplies were down 2.2 million barrels. Gasoline […]
OPEC Considers Extending Production Cuts
June 2, 2020
OPEC is trying to move the date of the meeting up so they can decide sooner rather than later to extend production cuts and offer support to the market. It looks like the meeting will be held on the June fourth, move up from the original date of June ninth. […]
China Pauses Purchases of U.S. Ag Commodities
June 1, 2020
OPEC and Russia are working to extend the current production cuts for another two months. Despite production falling these countries know there is still a glut of oil that needs to be worked off and they need to continue to limit supplies all they can. But it is a very […]
U.S. Oil Production to Bottom in June?
May 28, 2020
Morgan Stanley raised its year-end Brent price forecast to $40 per barrel. It cited a faster-than-expected rise in global oil demand as countries ease coronavirus restrictions and oil producers cut supply. Morgan Stanley estimates as much as 6 million bpd will be undersupplied to the market by the end of […]
Supply and Demand to Balance by June?
May 27, 2020
Bjornar Tonhaugen of Rystad Energy says supply and demand may balance sooner than expected. The market is currently oversupplied by 16 million barrels per day in crude and that could be reversed altogether by June according to Tonghaugen. A 4-million-barrel-per-day recovery in crude demand and a 12-million-barrel-per-day cut in crude […]
Rig Count Totals Continue to Plummet
May 26, 2020
Rig counts continues to decline. The Baker Hughes report on showed a decline of 21 rigs from the prior week and a new total of 237 rigs. There were 797 rigs in operation at this time last year – a difference of 560 rigs. This is the lowest rig count […]