Most Energy Contracts Are Seeing Modest Gains To Start Thursday’s Session

Market TalkThursday, May 5 2022
Pivotal Week For Price Action

Most energy contracts are seeing modest gains to start Thursday’s session after the FED and fundamentals both gave a big boost to buyers Wednesday. 

The only contract moving into the red this morning is June HO which is seeing its premium to outer months come back to something resembling sanity, while the majority of the complex moves higher.

While the FOMC announcement sent stocks on one of their biggest daily rallies on record, energy contracts were already staging a strong rally as the weekly inventory reports from the API and DOE remind buyers that there are no short term solutions to the supply crunch. 

A surge in gasoline imports helped PADD 1 inventories tick higher after reaching a multi-year low last week, while the rest of the US saw healthy declines. Diesel does not have the luxury of international length coming to the rescue, pushing total US inventories to a fresh 8 year low, while PADD 1 stocks fell to a new record low. The arbitrage window from just about anywhere in the US to the East Coast is wide open for those with a truck, train or boat, the people to drive them and the nerves to ship into a market that’s trading $1.30/gallon lower in September than it is today.  

The PADD 1 refiners that survived several bleak years are being rewarded for their perseverance with diesel margins that are being measured in dollars per gallon instead of dollars per barrel, and have increased run rates to their highest level since the start of the pandemic as a result. While other refiners have discussed delaying maintenance this summer to continue operating in this rare margin environment, run rates in each of the other 4 PADDs declined on the week which certainly isn’t helping the tight supply situations in most markets.

As expected, the FOMC announced a 50 point rate increase Wednesday, the first increase of that size in almost 22 years. What surprised just about everyone however was that the FED chair took the idea of a 75 point hike at the upcoming meetings off the table, which sparked a huge rally in equities that seemed to spill over into energy contracts as well. The CME’s Fedwatch tool shows that essentially no one is betting on a Fed Funds rate of 1.75% or higher in July, whereas yesterday before the announcement, 99% of the wagers were at or above that level.

While the FED probably can’t do anything to flatten the front end of the backwardated diesel curve, it is likely that the rally in equities could encourage more buying in the forward months for crude oil and diesel as a slower pace of interest rate hikes seems to reduce the likelihood of a recession.

Meanwhile, don’t expect politicians to sit back and not pretend to do nothing about high fuel prices in an election year. Congress is taking another run at making OPEC illegal as the mid-terms draw near. Read here to see what it would take to actually make this a law after numerous failed attempts in previous decades, and what the risks are if it happens.

Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk, including all charts from the Weekly DOE Report.

Market Talk Update 05.05.22

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Pivotal Week For Price Action
Market TalkThursday, Mar 28 2024

Energy Markets Are Ticking Modestly Higher Heading Into The Easter Weekend With Crude Oil Prices Leading The Way Up About $1.25/Barrel Early Thursday Morning

Energy markets are ticking modestly higher heading into the Easter Weekend with crude oil prices leading the way up about $1.25/barrel early Thursday morning, while gasoline prices are up around 2.5 cents and ULSD futures are about a penny.

Today is the last trading day for April HO and RBOB futures, an unusually early expiration due to the month ending on a holiday weekend. None of the pricing agencies will be active tomorrow since the NYMEX and ICE contracts are completely shut, so most rack prices published tonight will carry through Monday.

Gasoline inventories broke from tradition and snapped a 7 week decline as Gulf Coast supplies increased, more than offsetting the declines in PADDs 1, 2 and 5. With gulf coast refiners returning from maintenance and cranking out summer grade gasoline, the race is now officially on to move their excess through the rest of the country before the terminal and retail deadlines in the next two months. While PADD 3 run rates recover, PADD 2 is expected to see rates decline in the coming weeks with 2 Chicago-area refineries scheduled for planned maintenance, just a couple of weeks after BP returned from 7 weeks of unplanned repairs.

Although terminal supplies appear to be ample around the Baltimore area, we have seen linespace values for shipping gasoline on Colonial tick higher in the wake of the tragic bridge collapse as some traders seem to be making a small bet that the lack of supplemental barge resupply may keep inventories tight until the barge traffic can move once again. The only notable threat to refined product supplies is from ethanol barge traffic which will need to be replaced by truck and rail options, but so far that doesn’t seem to be impacting availability at the rack. Colonial did announce that they would delay the closure of its underutilized Baltimore north line segment that was scheduled for April 1 to May 1 out of an “abundance of caution”.

Ethanol inventories reached a 1-year high last week as output continues to hold above the seasonal range as ethanol distillers seem to be betting that expanded use of E15 blends will be enough to offset sluggish gasoline demand. A Bloomberg article this morning also highlights why soybeans are beginning to displace corn in the subsidized food to fuel race.

Flint Hills reported a Tuesday fire at its Corpus Christi West facility Wednesday, although it’s unclear if that event will have a material impact on output after an FCC unit was “stabilized” during the fire. While that facility isn’t connected to Colonial, and thus doesn’t tend to have an impact on USGC spot pricing, it is a key supplier to the San Antonio, Austin and DFW markets, so any downtime may be felt at those racks.

Meanwhile, P66 reported ongoing flaring at its Borger TX refinery due to an unknown cause. That facility narrowly avoided the worst wildfires in state history a few weeks ago but is one of the frequent fliers on the TCEQ program with upsets fairly common in recent years.

Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk, including all charts from the Weekly DOE Report.

Pivotal Week For Price Action
Pivotal Week For Price Action
Market TalkWednesday, Mar 27 2024

Most Energy Contracts Are Ticking Lower For A 2nd Day After A Trickle Of Selling Picked Up Steam Tuesday

Most energy contracts are ticking lower for a 2nd day after a trickle of selling picked up steam Tuesday. ULSD futures are down a dime from Monday’s highs and RBOB futures are down 7 cents.

Diesel prices continue to look like the weak link in the energy chain, with futures coming within 1 point of their March lows overnight, setting up a test of the December lows around $2.48 if that resistance breaks down. Despite yesterday’s slide, RBOB futures still look bullish on the weekly charts, with a run towards the $3 mark still looking like a strong possibility in the next month or so.

The API reported crude stocks increased by more than 9 million barrels last week, while distillates were up 531,000 and gasoline stocks continued their seasonal decline falling by 4.4 million barrels. The DOE’s weekly report is due out at its normal time this morning.

RIN values have recovered to their highest levels in 2 months around $.59/RIN for D4 and D6 RINs, even though the recovery rally in corn and soybean prices that had helped lift prices off of the 4 year lows set in February has stalled out. Expectations for more biofuel production to be shut in due to weak economics with lower subsidy values seems to be encouraging the tick higher in recent weeks, although prices are still about $1/RIN lower than this time last year.

Reminder that Friday is one of only 3 annual holidays in which the Nymex is completely shut, so no prices will be published, but it’s not a federal holiday in the US so banks will be open.

Click here to download a PDF of today's TACenergy Market Talk.