Baker Hughes Reported A Decline Of 7 Oil Rigs Drilling In The US, While The Natural Gas Rig Count Held Steady
It’s another mixed bag for energy markets to start the week, with ULSD trying to follow through on its strong showing Friday, while RBOB is flat and WTI is trading modestly lower to start the day.
Natural gas prices have rebounded sharply in the past 4 days, reaching $2.69 overnight after trading as low as $1.96 last Wednesday. The restart of the Freeport export facility, and some forecast models calling for below average temps in March after a much warmer than normal winter are both getting credit for that rally, which is no doubt having some positive impact on ULSD prices which have rallied 15 cents since reaching their lowest levels in 13 months last week, just as natural gas prices were bottoming out.
The CFTC issued its first set of commitments of trader's data in nearly a month Friday, releasing data originally scheduled to be published from January 31. The agency hopes to get caught up with its reporting by Mid-March. In case you were wondering, the contracts directly impacted by the cyber-attack, based on the latest update were “IFED MISO IN RT Off-Peak and CME USD Malaysian Crude Palm Oil Calendar Spread contract markets”. Somehow, I think the world could have managed without seeing the COT data on those two contracts.
While we’re still a couple of weeks behind for NYMEX contracts, we can see the money flows in ICE Brent and Gasoil contracts, and no surprise there it’s been steady liquidation by hedge funds for diesel contracts so far in February as prices have crumbled.
Baker Hughes reported a decline of 7 oil rigs drilling in the US, while the natural gas rig count held steady. California, New Mexico, Oklahoma and West Virginia all had a decline of 2 or more rigs on the week, while Texas held steady. Canada looks like it has topped out for its winter drilling season, with a reduction of 5 rigs on the week.
Russia’s influence on European energy supplies continues to be a wild card, with changes continuing on a near daily basis. Over the weekend we saw reports that Russia was allowing shipments of crude from Kazakhstan to Germany to begin flowing after delaying them for several weeks only then to find out that Russia had cut off shipments to Poland due to “paperwork issues”. Neither event seemed to have much influence on futures prices but serve as a reminder that despite the relative calm that’s taken over markets so far in 2023, there are still plenty of unknowns in the global supply network this year.
The Deer Park TX refinery was forced to shut its smaller crude unit after a fire on Thursday, which was one of 3 fires to hit owner Pemex’s operations in the US and Mexico that day.
So far there are no reports of major issues at California refineries following the blizzard, although power outages in the region were numerous.
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View AllRefined Products Are Moving Lower For A 2nd Day After Coming Under Heavy Selling Pressure In Wednesday’s Session
Refined products are moving lower for a 2nd day after coming under heavy selling pressure in Wednesday’s session. Rapidly increasing refinery runs and sluggish diesel demand both seemed to weigh heavily on product prices, while crude oil is still benefitting from the disruption of exports from Iraq. Prices remain range-bound, so expect more choppy back and forth action in the weeks ahead.
US oil inventories saw a large decline last week, despite another 13-million barrels of oil being found in the weekly adjustment figure, as imports dropped to a 2-year low, and refinery runs cranked up in most regions as many facilities return from spring maintenance.
The refining utilization percentage jumped to its highest level of the year but remains overstated since the new 250,000 barrels/day of output from Exxon’s Beaumont facility still isn’t being counted in the official capacity figures. If you’re shocked that the government report could have such a glaring omission, then you haven’t been paying attention to the Crude Adjustment figure this year, and the artificially inflated petroleum demand estimates that have come with it.
Speaking of which, we’re now just a couple of months away from WTI Midland crude oil being included in the Dated Brent index, and given the uncertainty in the US over what should be classified as oil vs condensate, expect some confusion once those barrels start being included in the international benchmark as well.
Diesel demand continues to hover near the lowest levels we’ve seen for the first quarter in the past 20+ years, dropping sharply again last week after 2 straight weeks of increases had some markets hoping that the worst was behind us. Now that we’re moving out of the heating season, we’ll soon get more clarity on how on road and industrial demand is holding up on its own in the weekly figures that have been heavily influenced by the winter that wasn’t across large parts of the country.
Speaking of which, the EIA offered another mea culpa of sorts Wednesday by comparing its October Winter Fuels outlook to the current reality, which shows a huge reduction in heating demand vs expectations just 6-months ago.
It’s not just domestic consumption of diesel that’s under pressure, exports have fallen below their 5-year average as buyers in South America are buying more Russian barrels, and European nations are getting more from new facilities in the Middle East.
Take a look at the spike in PADD 5 gasoline imports last week to get a feel for how the region may soon be forced to adjust to rapidly increasing refining capacity in Asia, while domestic facilities come under pressure.
Crude Oil Prices Are Trying To Lead Another Rally In Energy Futures This Morning
Crude oil prices are trying to lead another rally in energy futures this morning, while ULSD prices are resisting the pull higher. Stocks are pointed higher in the early going as no news is seen as good news in the banking crisis.
WTI prices have rallied by $10/barrel in the past 7 trading days, even with a $5 pullback last Thursday and Friday. The recovery puts WTI back in the top half of its March trading range but there’s still another $7 to go before the highs of the month are threatened.
Yesterday’s API report seems to be aiding the continued strength in crude, with a 6 million barrel inventory decline estimated by the industry group last week. That report also showed a decline of 5.9 million barrels of gasoline which is consistent with the spring pattern of drawdowns as we move through the RVP transition, while distillates saw a build of 550k barrels. The DOE’s weekly report is due out at its normal time this morning.
Diesel prices seems to be reacting both to the small build in inventories – which is yet another data point of the weak demand so far this year for distillates – and on the back of crumbling natural gas prices that settled at their lowest levels in 2.5 years yesterday and fell below $2/million BTU this morning.
While diesel futures are soft, rack markets across the Southwestern US remain unusually tight, with spreads vs spot markets approaching $1/gallon in several cases as local refiners go through maintenance and pipeline capacity for resupply remains limited. The tightest supply in the region however remains the Phoenix CBG boutique gasoline grade which is going for $1.20/gallon over spots as several of the few refineries that can make that product are having to perform maintenance at the same time.
French refinery strikes continue for a 4th week and are estimated to be keeping close to 1 million barrels/day of fuel production offline, which is roughly 90% of French capacity and almost 1% of total global capacity. That disruption is having numerous ripple effects on crude oil markets in the Atlantic basin, while the impact on refined product supplies and prices remains much more contained than it was when this happened just 5 months ago.
Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.