RE:RE:Dr. Anas: Oil, OPEC, and RussiaLOL. Listen to the audio then, link was a few posts back.
Regarding oil, one must listen to what the market is telling and showing us. It wants to go down.
IMHO, oil will not rise yet on its own for a while, unless there is a market moving event. Liquidity is gone, and hedge funds and trading houses are letting it blow off some steam, as crunch time is still a few months away. XLE is being sold off the recent double top highs and profits are being taken on the huge runup this year as the best performing sector in the market. They are sold off even while they continue paying down debt, doing share buybacks, dividends, and still generate huge cash. By association, our oil companies are in for the ride. So, enjoy the rare buying opportunities coming to the theater near you again, and wait for the turn.
The market knows global inventories are running lower, it knows the futures curve is in backwardation meaning higher future prices months away, and it knows China will come back with demand after dealing with reopening, and a bad spread of Covid like the rest of the world did.
It also knows there will be another 750K bpd of oil demand being burned next summer in the middle east for cooling season.
It knows US rig counts are flattening, and frac spreads are maxed out, along with delays in completions, and low DUC counts. It knows Tier 1 shale acreage is almost exhausted, and there is a 50% depletion rate in the first year of a shale well.
It knows Russian oil is making its way to Asia, but some future supply will be constrained, leading to cuts in Russian volumes.
It knows Biden can't buy oil at $72 now as he said he would, as he must first complete or cancel the 30M bbls of Congressional mandated SPR sale releases for 2023. SPR pipes do not run in both directions at the same time. The next SPR releases are not so much of an issue, as they are mostly light sweet, not what refiners want.
Oil is now around the marginal costs of production for some shale basins, and companies are unhedged. This price does not support more drilling. US rigs fell by 4 to 780 this week, while frac spreads fell by 10 to 290.
It knows this is just a seasonal build time in products, along with a little less seasonal consumer demand.
It knows there is a recession coming, and winter.
Product inventories in the US east coast PADD1 are building slightly, reducing the threat of running out of diesel, jet, and heating oils. However, this means product prices are dropping, cutting into the crack spreads.
OPEC is not going to step in yet with a cut, and are taking a wait and see approach to the embargo and price cap. Also many producing countries don't want to cut, although most can't even meet their preasent quotas.
For our oil, the Keystone leak and shutdown didn't help. WTI initially went up, while the WCS/WTI diff widened. Today when it was announced they will partialy restart tomorrow, WTI then dropped to $70, and the diff narrowed.
It also knows TMX will be online this time next year, and there will be a shortage of heavy oils soon for USGC refiners, and held in the SPR, hence the panic there to get Venezuelan heavies flowing to the US.
It also knows this is past my usual bedtime. Goodnight all.
pooltec wrote: Can't stay awake reading this. So is oil going up and when?