Energy Market Updates

Posts about:

Iran

Navigating Stability Amidst Global Tensions & Winter Dynamics

The trend to lower lows every 15 days or so appears to have subsided.  Does this mean the market has found a comfort level for the next few weeks?  My sense is that most are still weighing the Global Demand vs Mid East Risk Premium battle that we mentioned last week.  Global tensions continue to be elevated as Houthis strikes have reached vessels in the Red Sea, Pakistan has now struck Iranian targets and the war of words between all nations ramps ups.  The strike first, speak later motto is what has most on edge.  With Inventories set to be released this morning, a day later due to the Holiday, a careful eye will be not just on stocks, but demand, specifically in the distillate sector.   While the middle of the Country saw a cold snap  last week, here in the Northeast we are starting to get towards more seasonable temperatures.  Again, stay the course with Diesel Winterization programs. 

Sideways market movements are often the most difficult to deal with.   While they do bring some stability to overall costs, the day to day gyrations can leave us scratching our heads.  It is important to be in close contact with your supplier and Rep to be aware of what happens throughout the day.  More so in the winter as sometimes future market movements do not translate to local physical markets. Schedule a Meeting

Read More

World Fuel Markets React to Escalating Hamas-Israeli Conflict

The obvious market moving story is the impact on world fuel markets of the Hamas – Israeli conflict that appears to be growing more intense by the day.  As traders are trying to digest what could turn into a regional mess, expect wild swings for the short term. 

At the root is how much, if any, was Iran involved as they have openly backed Hamas.  Furthermore, the US and others, have been turning a blind eye to Iran’s oil production in an effort to keep global markets well supplied.  It is a tight rope to walk for sure.  Putting downward pressure on markets in the US are revised demand figures that are now to said to be about 25% less than originally forecasted through the end of 2025.  For a variety of factors which we all are seeing on a daily basis be it better fuel efficiencies, alternative energies, or just a slowdown.  Additionally, it started to come out that Saudi Arabia is not abiding by their self imposed cuts, news struck that the Kingdom has agreed to fully supply several far east customers.   My sense is that we will bounce around this current range just below $3.00 on the screen before ultimately pulling back some more.

Even though pricing remains high in the near term, it still important to look further out.  Next spring distillate pricing remains significantly less than current pricing and some bargains might exist.  For budgeting purposes, bidding jobs, or locking in pricing, we can assist you for your organizations specific needs. Schedule a Call

Read More

De-Escalation Walks Back Overnight Oil Gains

shutterstock_1099946876

What a wild start to 2020 for the oil markets! 

Friday saw morning trading jump ~4% on the Pentagon's confirmation that the United States had launched airstrikes and taken out Iran's top commander in Iraq. Prices gave back about half their gains during trading on Friday with the settle at $63.05/bbl Crude, $2.0614 ULSD & $1.7488 RBOB. 

Gains continued to slowly pare off through trading Monday & Tuesday, for the most part.

That is until Tuesday night. 

After a few day's of relative quiet (outside of Twitter, anyway), last night Iran commenced retaliatory strikes against the US by launching missiles at two US Bases in Iraq housing military members, as well as towards the US consulate in Ebril (the consulate was not hit). There were no casualties in the strikes. 

Upon news of the missile strikes, the market shot up almost 5% on overnight trading. 

Despite the overnights being up so sharply, by today's open when it was clear there were not massive US casualties (which would all but guarantee further action), the market was essentially flat and plummeted through the day as news updates became available.

Today's round of press conferences and news briefs indicated strongly that Iran was signaling that they would not retaliate further, and as of the moment the US position is apparently to de-escalate by working on sanction proposals versus further military strikes. Of course, both of these positions are subject to change at a moments notice, and it's entirely possible sanctions are interpreted by Iran as escalation, but for the moment we at least have some calm on the Iran/US tension front and hopefully that continues. 

At the close,Crude settled out below $60/bbl again, at $59.61, ULSD shed .0742 to close at $1.9582, and RBOB lost .0734 to settle at $1.6488. 

Stay Tuned! 

Read More

2020 Starts with Surging on Iran Strikes

shutterstock_1099946876

Today, the market surged up to 4% on intraday highs as the Pentagon confirmed that US Airstrikes in Bahgdad killed Iran's top commander, Qasem Soleimani. Soleimani was considered to be responsible for the attacks by Iran on the US Embassy earlier this week, and the strikes have been framed as a retaliation for those attacks, as well as a preemptive action to prevent alleged further attacks in the works on US targets in the region.

This afternoon, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei promised retaliation ("Severe Revenge"), and the US announced that 3500 additional troops would be deploying to the Middle East. 

Concerns are obviously mounting about the nature of Iranian retaliation for the strikes, with the major concerns being either an escalation to war between the US & Iran, or that we will see Iran begin to attack crucial infrastructure in the region again, like they allegedly did in Saudi Arabia this past September. 

It is important to remember however, that when last September's attack took 5.7mmb out of global supply instantaneously, and essentially halved Saudi Arabia's production capacity, the markets spiked, but had essentially returned to flat within a few trading days.

That is to say - it's anyone's guess whether we continue to climb or the market does a quick turnaround over the next week of trading.

We did back off intraday highs by the close, where ULSD was up +.0373 to 2.0614, RBOB was up +.0446 to 1.7488, and Crude settled at $63.05/bbl.

However, the story is still developing so it's hard to know what impact any late afternoon & weekend developments may or may not have on the the electronics as well as Monday's open. 

Stay Tuned! 

Read More

NYMEX spikes in wake of Saudi Arabia attacks

saudi arabia

Saturday, ten unmanned drones struck a major Saudi Aramco facility in Saudi Arabia, and immediately took 5.7 million barrels out of the global supply. The Abqaiq plant that was impacted is one of the world's largest processors. 

The Saudi government indicated that Iranian weapons were responsible but stopped short of blaming Iran for the attack, (although US Secretary of State Pompeo did NOT stop short and explicitly called Iran out in a series of tweets).

Yemeni Houthi rebels have taken credit for the strike, and threatened further escalation but it's unclear if they are, in fact, responsible.

Initial reports seem to indicate the attack did not come from Yemen, but Iran has denied any involvement. A lot of the long range implications of the attack will of course hinge on whether military escalation from other nations becomes probable, which directly depends on whether Iran, Yemeni rebels, or a third party was responsible. 

Markets reacted in a big way - Crude was up on the overnights, and Crude, ULSD & RBOB all surged within seconds of the open, and never came back down. 

At the close, ULSD was up a whopping +.2060 to $2.0838, RBOB +.1993 to $1.7524 and Crude $62.90 (+8.05 over Friday's settle) 

This is still a developing story - CNN has a great, continually updating article you can follow new developments on in real time here: Saudi Attacks Send Oil Prices Soaring 

Read More

Talk of Easing Iran Sanctions Trumps Crude Draws

shutterstock_1099946876

After starting the morning up on the EIA inventory reports of large crude draws (-6.9 mmb), the NYMEX dropped later through today's trading, as more information about the firing of US National Security Advisor John Bolton came to light, and as global demand growth estimates were revised downward yet again. 

The reason an Advisor firing is at all relevant to the oil markets is: Iran.

There was speculation immediately that Bolton's firing was a good sign for US-Iranian relations, and as details emerge it seems that speculation was not only accurate, but an undersell.

Bloomberg is reporting that the Administration discussed easing sanctions in order to broker meetings with Iranian President Rhouhani and kickstart negotiations. Evidently the support voiced for doing so led to a blowout of sorts that prompted the firing. 

Prices dropped almost instantaneously on the news that sanctions could potentially be eased on Iran. 

Additionally, today OPEC's estimates for global growth demand were revised downward (but worth noting is that the revision puts their estimates in line with those of other analysts and economists already existent predictions). The EIA numbers were revised slightly down yesterday as well (down 100,000 bpd from the August prediction to 900,000 bpd).

Overall it appears that for at least today's session, the current market of OPEC cuts and US domestic crude draws did not outweigh longer term concerns about a potential future supply glut in the face of low growth demand. 

At the close, Crude settled at $55.75/bbl, ULSD shed .0280 to close at $1.9032, and RBOB dropped .0209 to close at $1.5699

We'll have to see what happens tomorrow. 

 

Read More

Today's Market = John Bolton Firing vs OPEC Cuts

shutterstock_651733465

This past Friday, ahead of the scheduled OPEC meeting this week, Saudi Arabia abruptly announced a new Energy Minister, Prince Adbulaziz. The move sparked momentary concern that this was a signal the Saudi's would be reversing course on the OPEC+ production cut agreement, but it appears they are actually doubling down.

The kingdom announced they would be adhering to and encouraging the production cuts going forward, and Russian officials announced that they fully anticipated continuing the current trajectory with the new leadership. 

This consensus initially let prices continue their several day climb, with WTI hitting a 6 week high momentarily ... BUT!

But this afternoon, the Trump Administration announced the firing of US National Security Advisor John Bolton.

Bolton was extremely vocal regarding his hardline stance against Iran, and his "resignation" may be a positive signal for future progress on peace talks with Iran, and in the near term, may be a good move to de-escalate the current situation, a lot of which has impacted the oil industry via threats to tankers & the threat to block the Strait of Hormuz. 

Prices have backed off intraday highs following the Bolton announcement. Essentially any hint of resolution with Iran, while positive, also renews concerns about Iranian supply flooding the market, and that is pushing down on pricing (despite the prematurity of any concern). 

Time will tell how the interplay between production cuts and lingering supply concerns levels out, particularly depending on inventory reporting (which we should see tomorrow) and domestic production.

For today, at the close, we ended essentially flat. ULSD +.0035 to $1.9312, RBOB +.0062 to $1.5908

Stay Tuned! 

 

Read More

Markets Tumble on Trade War Tensions

china-us trade

The NYMEX tumbled back down today, erasing Friday's rally. At the close, ULSD shed .0546 to $1.8356, and RBOB dropped .0635 to $1.7180, with Crude closing at $54.69, which puts us back in the territory we saw on Thursday, essentially. (We were $1.8529, $1.7499 and $53.95 at the close Thursday after record slides).

The NYMEX wasn't the only market down today, as global stock markets slid on US/China trade war tensions.

So today, China threatened retaliatory action after the Trump Administration did not back down from tariff imposition threats. And then (stop me if you have heard this one before) Chinese currency hit suspicious new lows against the US dollar, which prompted renewed accusations of currency manipulation on the part of China by President Trump, which didn't sit well with Wall Street, who is looking for any sign of hope that tariffs and a potential full on trade war are not looming on the horizon....And then everything tumbled across the board, from the Dow Jones to the Nikkei. Phew. 

Bank of America also announced today that should China choose to purchase Iranian oil in response to US Tariffs, we could see oil tumble to "$20-$30/bbl" (although they did not revise their 2020 prediction of $60/bbl). The decision to purchase from Iran would serve to both weaken the impact of US backed sanctions on that country, as well as take a substantial amount of the impact out of the tariffs imposed on China. However, the move would not be without consequence, as Iran would be stepping outside the agreed upon production cut strategy in the region and that would likely not go over well with their neighbors (particularly Saudi Arabia) and would essentially force a heavier partnership than China may be interested in maintaining.

On the fundamentals, supply is still vastly outpacing demand, and economic indications continue to suggest that global demand will continue to soften. Whatever does or does not happen in terms of shorter news cycle events - seized tankers, trade disagreements, etc, the fundamental supply/demand levels will ultimately dictate a large portion of where crude & refined products settle out.... at least until another short term cycle event throws a wrench in the gears.

Stay Tuned!  

Read More

Iran Seizes Tankers in Strait of Hormuz

 

BREAKING - Iran's Republican Guard has reportedly captured 2 oil Tankers in the Strait of Hormuz this afternoon, one tanker being British and the other Liberian flagged.

News broke of the first  around 1:30pm EST, the second being just announced 3:15pm EST. 

So far the market is up but not sharply, but it's unclear that the impact of news of a second vessel has hit yet. The obvious fear with multiple seizures is that Iran plans to deliver on the perpetual threat of closing the Strait of Hormuz, although it is obviously entirely too soon to make any such prediction. 

CNN is live updating on the unfolding situation, you can follow those updates here:  CNN - Iran Seizes Tankers in Strait of Hormuz

Read More

Subscribe to Email Updates