Many In The Market Caught Off-Guard
Oil prices have spiked $5 a barrel, and refined products are up 12 cents/gallon since early Thursday morning after OPEC & friends announced they would not change their output cut agreement, which caught many in the market off-guard. The rally has propelled each of the big 4 petroleum futures contracts to their highest levels in more than a year, just a couple of days after it looked like the four month old trend might be breaking down.
The big rally in energy contracts comes in spite of a large selloff taking place in equity markets, which continue to act spooked by interest rates higher than 1%. You can make a strong argument that the two agencies most capable of moving energy prices with their policy are OPEC and the U.S. Federal reserve. Yesterday, we saw both in action with OPEC surprising the market to the upside, while the FED Chair apparently didn’t do enough to calm the stock markets. Given the two asset classes have had a strong positive correlation for most of the past year, this recent divergence could end up creating more volatility for energy contracts in the weeks to come, while a strong rally in the U.S. Dollar could finally pop the energy balloon.
Looking past the headlines of the OPEC announcement, there is some reason to pause given that the Saudi’s are still not convinced demand globally is capable of handling normal production levels. Then again, there is certainly a political angle to everything the cartel does, and it’s also possible that the U.S. reaction (or what critics call a lack of reaction) to the Saudi leadership’s role in the killing of Jamal Khashoggi could have played into this decision as well. A Bloomberg note this morning suggests that the move by the Saudi’s is a bet that U.S. oil producers will behave differently this time, even though they’ve behaved the same way for the past 150 years which has helped create the epic boom and bust cycles this market is famous for.
The refinery recovery efforts continue to progress with additional units coming online daily, but hiccups are common, and re-supply is not coming fast enough for those still scrambling to find allocation across Texas and neighboring states. The impacts on rack prices are spread much further however with markets from Arizona to Virginia all feeling the trickle down impacts of the heart of refining country shutting down for two weeks. Group 3 diesel differentials continue to stand out, spiking to premiums north of 30 cents Thursday morning before trading lower to end the day. That market has 20 cents of backwardation between now and the end of March, as traders bet that resupply should largely be complete by April, even though supplies continue to tick lower in the region this week.
Chicken or the egg: RIN values continue to set new multi-year highs this week, which is either helping drive the rally in refined products, or being driven by that rally depending on who you ask. There’s little news over the RFS program or the various legal challenges to it, and grain prices have been fairly flat, so it seems this rally could simply be the market betting that this new administration is unlikely to do anything that would help lower this de-facto tax on refiners.
Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.
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Energy Prices Fluctuate: Chinese Imports Surge, Saudi Arabia Cuts Output and Buys Golf
Energy prices continue their back-and-forth trading, starting Wednesday’s session with modest gains, after a round of selling Tuesday wiped out the Saudi output cut bounce.
A surge in China’s imports of crude oil and natural gas seem to be the catalyst for the early move higher, even though weak export activity from the world’s largest fuel buyer suggests the global economy is still struggling.
New tactic? Saudi Arabia’s plan to voluntarily cut oil production by another 1 million barrels/day failed to sustain a rally in oil prices to start the week, so they bought the PGA tour.
The EIA’s monthly Short Term Energy Outlook raised its price forecast for oil, citing the Saudi cuts, and OPEC’s commitment to extend current production restrictions through 2024. The increase in prices comes despite reducing the forecast for US fuel consumption, as GDP growth projections continue to decline from previous estimates.
The report included a special article on diesel consumption, and its changing relationship with economic activity that does a good job of explaining why diesel prices are $2/gallon cheaper today than they were a year ago.
The API reported healthy builds in refined product inventories last week, with distillates up 4.5 million barrels while gasoline stocks were up 2.4 million barrels in the wake of Memorial Day. Crude inventories declined by 1.7 million barrels on the week. The DOE’s weekly report is due out at its normal time this morning.
We’re still waiting on the EPA’s final ruling on the Renewable Fuel Standard for the next few years, which is due a week from today, but another Reuters article suggests that eRINs will not be included in this round of making up the rules.
Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.
Week 23 - US DOE Inventory Recap
Energy Prices Retreat, Global Demand Concerns Loom
So much for that rally. Energy prices have given back all of the gains made following Saudi Arabia’s announcement that it would voluntarily withhold another 1 million barrels/day of oil production starting in July. The pullback appears to be rooted in the ongoing concerns over global demand after a soft PMI report for May while markets start to focus on what the FED will do at its FOMC meeting next week.
The lack of follow through to the upside leaves petroleum futures stuck in neutral technical territory, and since the top end of the recent trading range didn’t break, it seems likely we could see another test of the lower end of the range in the near future.
RIN prices have dropped sharply in the past few sessions, with traders apparently not waiting on the EPA’s final RFS ruling – due in a week – to liquidate positions. D6 values dropped to their lowest levels in a year Monday, while D4 values hit a 15-month low. In unrelated news, the DOE’s attempt to turn seaweed into biofuels has run into a whale problem.
Valero reported a process leak at its Three Rivers TX refinery that lasted a fully 24 hours. That’s the latest in a string of upsets for south Texas refineries over the past month that have kept supplies from San Antonio, Austin and DFW tighter than normal. Citgo Corpus Christi also reported an upset over the weekend at a sulfur recovery unit. Several Corpus facilities have been reporting issues since widespread power outages knocked all of the local plants offline last month.
Meanwhile, the Marathon Galveston Bay (FKA Texas City) refinery had another issue over the weekend as an oil movement line was found to be leaking underground but does not appear to have impacted refining operations at the facility. Gulf Coast traders don’t seem concerned by any of the latest refinery issues, with basis values holding steady to start the week.
Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.