Demand Fears Are Outpacing Supply Fears To Start Tuesday’s Trading As China Has Initiated Yet Another Round Of COVID Crackdowns
Demand fears are outpacing supply fears to start Tuesday’s trading as China has initiated yet another round of COVID crackdowns, shutting down markets and cities across the world’s largest oil importer. Gasoline prices are down a dime in the early going, and crude oil prices have already erased most of Monday’s big gains.
Diesel prices are resisting the big pull lower from crude and gasoline today – after dropping by a dime Monday – following reports that Russia is cutting more natural gas deliveries, this time to France, as Moscow continues to use its most powerful weapon in its war on Europe.
Speaking of which, a WSJ article this week highlights that even though Russia may be fumbling in its shooting war in Ukraine, its energy revenue has continued to grow as the world has shifted to find new ways to get their oil and products to market as creative traders find no shortage of loopholes in the current sanctions.
European leaders agreed to meet next week to come up with emergency plans to deal with runaway electricity prices that are pushing households across the continent to the brink of bankruptcy or worse. Price caps for natural gas are one of main ideas being floated to deal with this issue temporarily, even though price caps can be counterproductive as they remove the incentive for some producers to rush to bring more output online.
BP’s Whiting refinery outside of Chicago has initiated restart, and could be back up and running by the weekend if all goes well, which is easing concerns of a regional supply crunch that prompted the EPA to waive summer RVP specs a few weeks early.
While refinery capacity losses have justifiably grabbed many headlines over the past year, ExxonMobil has been quietly expanding one of its facilities, in Beaumont TX, and is ready to bring 250,000 barrels/day of new capacity online early next year. That additional capacity is the equivalent of one above-average size refinery, and will effectively replace the 260,000 barrels/day facility that was killed by Hurricane Ida last year.
There are very good odds we’ll have a named storm heading towards the US by Labor day, with the NHC still giving 80% odds of development for a system moving across the Atlantic. The good news is that forecast models suggest there are low odds that this storm will hit the US, and will more likely stay out to sea as it moves north parallel to the East Coast next week. A 2nd system is currently given 40% odds of development in the next 5 days as it moves out to the Atlantic, and long range models suggest we should expect a new system every few days for the next several weeks as conditions for development improve.
Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.
Latest Posts
Energy Markets Are Ticking Modestly Higher This Morning But Remain Well Off The Highs Set Early Thursday
The Yo-Yo Action In Diesel Continues With Each Day Alternating Between Big Gains And Big Losses So Far This Week
Week 38- US DOE Inventory Recap
It’s A Soft Start For Energy Markets Wednesday As Traders Await The Weekly Inventory Report, And The FOMC
Social Media
News & Views
View AllEnergy Markets Are Ticking Modestly Higher This Morning But Remain Well Off The Highs Set Early Thursday
Energy markets are ticking modestly higher this morning but remain well off the highs set early Thursday following the reports that Russia was temporarily banning most refined product exports.
The law of government intervention and unintended consequences: Russian officials claim the export ban is an effort to promote market stability, and right on cue, its gasoline prices plummeted a not-so-stable 10% following the news.
There’s a saying that bull markets don’t end due to bad news, they end when the market stops rallying on good news. It’s possible that if ULSD futures continue lower after failing to sustain yesterday’s rally, or this morning’s, we could be seeing the end of the most recent bull run. That said, it’s still much too soon to call the top here, particularly with a steepening forward curve leaving prices susceptible to a squeeze, and the winter-demand months still ahead of us. Short term we need to see ULSD hold above $3.30 next week to avoid breaking its weekly trend line.
The sell-off in RIN values picked up steam Thursday, with 2023 D4 and D6 values dropping to the $1.02 range before finally finding a bid later in the session and ending the day around $1.07.
Tropical Storm Ophelia is expected to be named today, before making landfall on the North Carolina coast tomorrow. This isn’t a major storm, and there aren’t any refineries in its path, so it’s unlikely to do much to disrupt supply, but it will dump heavy rain several of the major East Coast markets so it will likely hamper demand through the weekend. The other storm system being tracked by the NHC is now given 90% odds of being named next week, but its predicted path has shifted north as it moves across the Atlantic, which suggests it is more likely to stay out to sea like Nigel did than threaten either the Gulf or East Coasts.
Exxon reported an upset at its Baytown refinery that’s been ongoing for the past 24 hours. It’s still unclear which units are impacted by this event, and whether or not it will have meaningful impacts on output. Total’s Pt Arthur facility also reported an upset yesterday, but that event lasted less than 90 minutes. Like most upsets in the region recently, traders seem to be shrugging off the news with gulf coast basis values not moving much.
Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.
The Yo-Yo Action In Diesel Continues With Each Day Alternating Between Big Gains And Big Losses So Far This Week
The yo-yo action in diesel continues with each day alternating between big gains and big losses so far this week. Today’s 11-cent rally is being blamed on reports that Russia is cutting exports of refined products effective immediately. It’s been a while since Russian sabre rattling has driven a noticeable price move in energy futures, after being a common occurrence at the start of the war. Just like tweets from our prior President however, these types of announcements seem to have a diminishing shelf-life, particularly given how the industry has adapted to the change in Russian export flows, so don’t be surprised if the early rally loses steam later today.
The announcement also helped gasoline prices rally 5-cents off of their overnight lows, and cling to modest gains just above a penny in the early going. Before the announcement, RBOB futures were poised for a 5th straight day of losses.
IF the export ban lasts, that would be good news for US refiners that have seen their buyers in south American countries – most notably Brazil – reduce their purchases in favor of discounted barrels from Russia this year.
US refinery runs dropped below year-ago levels for the first time in 6 weeks, with PADDS 1, 2 and 3 all seeing large declines at the start of a busy fall maintenance schedule. Oil inventories continued to decline, despite the drop-in run rates and a big increase in the adjustment factor as oil exports surged back north of 5 million barrels/day. Keep in mind that as recently as 2011 the US only produced 5 million barrels of oil every day, and exports were mostly banned until 2016, so to be sending this many barrels overseas is truly a game changer for the global market.
Chicken or the egg? Cushing OK oil stocks dropped below year-ago levels for the first time since January last week, which may be caused by the return of backwardation incenting shippers to lower inventory levels, the shift to new WTI Midland and Houston contracts as the export market expands. Of course, the low inventory levels are also blamed for causing the backwardation in crude oil prices, and the shift to an export market may keep inventories at the NYMEX hub lower for longer as fewer shippers want to go inland with their barrels.
Refined product inventories remain near the bottom end of their seasonal ranges, with a healthy recovery in demand after last week’s holiday hangover helping keep stocks in check. The biggest mover was a large jump in PADD 5 distillates, which was foreshadowed by the 30 cent drop in basis values the day prior. The big story for gasoline on the week was a surge in exports to the highest level of the year, which is helping keep inventories relatively tight despite the driving season having ended 2 weeks ago.
As expected, the FED held rates yesterday, but the open market committee also included a note that they expected to raise rates one more time this year, which sparked a selloff in equity markets that trickled over into energy prices Wednesday afternoon. The correlation between energy and equities has been non-existent of late, and already this morning we’re seeing products up despite equities pointing lower, so it doesn’t look like the FOMC announcement will have a lasting impact on fuel prices this time around.