Новости за 09.04.2024

Crude oil inventories in the United States rose this week by 3.034 million barrels for the week ending April 5, according to The American Petroleum Institute (API). Analysts had expected an inventory build of 2.415 million barrels. This comes after the API reported a 2.286 million barrel dip in crude inventories in the week prior. On Tuesday, the Department of Energy (DoE) reported that crude oil inventories in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) rose by another 0.6 million barrels as of April 5. Читать дальше...

The scaling back of the megacity project is attributed to budget constraints, with the Public Investment Fund's cash reserves dropping to $15bn in September 2023.Saudi Arabia has scaled back some of its ambitions for its desert megacity Neom, according to a report by Bloomberg. The $1.5 trillion megacity project, which organizers claim will be 33 times the size of New York City, is due to include a 170km straight-line city. When launching The Line in 2021, the Saudi government had announced that... Читать дальше...

In a landmark move aimed at fortifying critical energy infrastructure, six northern European countries bordering the North Sea have signed an agreement today to enhance protection measures for underwater assets, including gas pipelines and electricity cables. The accord comes in response to the 2022 explosions targeting the Nord Stream gas pipelines, incidents that were classified as acts of sabotage but remain unsolved. Denmark, Belgium, Britain, Germany, Norway, and the Netherlands are the signatories to this pivotal agreement... Читать дальше...

Via Metal Miner Liberty Steel recently announced a restructuring plan for its operations in the United Kingdom after signing a new framework agreement with creditors. Among other things, the ambitious plan includes hiking crude steel manufacturing capacity at its Rotherham plant. The London-based company noted that the plan would see Liberty consolidate all its operations in the UK into one organization under a new entity and corporate structure. “It is proposed that the existing companies will transfer... Читать дальше...

Iran could close the major oil shipping route known as the Strait of Hormuz if necessary, the commander of Iran's Revolution Guard's navy said on Tuesday. But for now, it will keep it open, he added. The warning came following Israel's presence in the United Arab Emirates, which Alirez Tangsiri says he sees as a threat, and Israel's airstrikes on Iran's consulate in Syria earlier this month. "We do not get hit without striking back, but we are also not hasty in our retaliation," Tangsiri said. Iran's... Читать дальше...

The European Union and United States are incentivizing Armenia to maintain its westward geopolitical shift. The growing EU-US role in supporting the country’s reform efforts is drawing a predictably hostile reaction from Russia and Azerbaijan. A meeting April 5 in Brussels involving Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, European Commission President Ursula von Der Leyen, EU Vice President Josep Borrell and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yielded a significant assistance windfall for Armenia. Читать дальше...

Big Oil is trumping the Magnificent Seven on the stock market this year in an oil stocks rally that few had expected a few months ago.   Energy stocks have outperformed the top tech stocks this year as the market has grown more bullish on oil and crude prices rallied at the end of the first quarter and at the start of the second quarter. How long and how high the so-far quiet rally will go will depend on the oil price trajectory this year.   In recent weeks, analysts have started to raise earnings... Читать дальше...

China’s seaborne coal imports jumped by 17% in the first quarter compared to the same period of 2023, despite earlier expectations that overall coal imports this year would be largely flat versus last year. Imports of all varieties of coal by sea into China stood at 97.43 million metric tons between January and March 2024, an increase of 16.9% from the 83.36 million tons imported in the same quarter last year, data compiled by commodity analysts Kpler and cited by Reuters columnist Clyde Russell showed on Tuesday. Читать дальше...

The chief economist at commodity trading giant Trafigura has warned the copper market could tighten further as a result of artificial intelligence. Speaking at the Financial Times Commodities Summit in Switzerland, Trafigura’s chief economist Saad Rahim said that growth has “suddenly exploded” as a result of the proliferation of global data centres. By 2030, this could amount to an additional 1m tons of need, Rahim said and that the figure is “on top of a 4-5m ton deficit gap by 2030 anyway”. He added... Читать дальше...

India has raised the share of coal in its power generation this month as sharply lower hydropower output is threatening blackouts as summer approaches. The share of coal in India’s power generation jumped to 77% in the first week of April, rising by around 2 percentage points compared to the same period of 2023, per data from the Grid Controller of India cited by Bloomberg. The higher coal use in the country has been compensating for much lower power generation from hydro resources as India braces... Читать дальше...

Morgan Stanley sees heightened geopolitical risk pushing Brent Crude oil prices to $94 per barrel in the third quarter as the bank lifted its price forecast by $4 a barrel from its previous projection. “That the degree of geopolitical risk in key oil producing regions has increased recently seems clear and uncontroversial,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote in a note cited by Reuters. Last month, the bank had already hiked its third-quarter oil price forecast by $10 per barrel, to $90, on the back of... Читать дальше...

U.S. supermajor Chevron has quit operations in Myanmar by transferring its stake in a natural gas field and an associated pipeline to its former partners in the ventures, after pledging to leave the Southeast Asian country following a military coup in 2021.     “The withdrawal gives effect to our intention to exit Myanmar in a controlled and orderly manner, following the February 2021 coup, and ongoing humanitarian crisis,” a spokesperson for Chevron has told Reuters. Chevron pledged in 2022 to exit Myanmar. Читать дальше...

Oil prices are set to trade in the range between $80 and $100 per barrel this year, Russell Hardy, chief executive at the world’s largest independent oil trader, Vitol Group, said at an industry conference on Tuesday. Vitol also expects robust global oil demand growth in 2024, at around 1.9 million barrels per day (bpd) higher than in 2023, Hardy told the audience at the FT Commodities Global Summit in Lausanne, Switzerland.   Oil prices jumped to above $90 per barrel last week—their highest level... Читать дальше...

As bullish sentiment continues to build and Brent settles comfortably above the $90 mark, oil prices look set to continue to climb this week.- German industrial production finally broke through the cycle of gloom after it posted a 2.1% increase in February, well above the consensus expectation of a 0.5% rise month-over-month.- Although Germany’s manufacturing is still below its pre-pandemic levels, the surprise hike in activity fuelled this week’s copper rally and reinforced the expectation of the... Читать дальше...

Oil majors listed in New York enjoy higher stock valuations and have friendlier investors and increased access to capital, Shell’s former CEO Ben van Beurden said on Tuesday, following media reports that Shell is considering shifting its listing from the London Stock Exchange (LSE) to the NYSE.    Shell is considering shifting its listing from London to New York, the Telegraph reported on Monday, citing the company’s CEO Wael Sawan. According to the UK daily newspaper, Shell is considering “all options”…

European energy infrastructure needs $2.7 trillion in investment to reach the EU’s climate goals by 2050 and keep Europe competitive on a global scale, lobby group the European Round Table for Industry (ERT) said in a new report on Tuesday. The EU’s ambition to be a carbon-neutral bloc by 2050 requires massive investments in energy infrastructure, including grid expansion, power storage, and infrastructure for low-carbon hydrogen and carbon capture, ERT said. “This is not a mere upgrade but a fundamental... Читать дальше...

The New Zealand government has plans to ban the import of internal combustion engine vehicles by 2040 as part of its net-zero efforts. According to local publication Stuff, a draft document prepared by the country’s Climate Change Commission suggests that “Decarbonising transport will require a rapid increase in electric vehicle (EV) sales so that nearly all vehicles entering the country are electric by 2035.” The move will be part of a push to achieve an almost complete electrification of transport... Читать дальше...

Mexico is planning to cut the amount of crude oil it exports by 330,000 barrels daily next month as it redirects supply to local refineries. The volume to be cut represents a third of the total that Mexico sells abroad, Reuters noted in a report, which also said 330,000 bpd is the minimum that will get redirected from overseas market to local refineries. This month, Pemex slashed oil exports by 436,000 barrels daily as Mexican refineries ramp up, including the new Dos Bocas facility, which will take in some 179,000 bpd this year. Читать дальше...

BMO dropped plans to curb lending to the coal industry last year to avoid accusations of energy boycotting from West Virginia, Bloomberg has reported, citing an update from West Virginian Treasurer Riley Moore. The update came in the form of a list of financial institutions that restrict lending to the state’s major industry and are exposed as seeking to destroy the state’s vital energy industry, per Moore. The list is a result of a Republican law passed in 2022, which names financial firms that... Читать дальше...

Historically, different market sectors and investments have responded differently as the economy moves from one stage of the business cycle to the next. Understanding how various  financial assets have historically performed at various points in the business cycle can help investors identify opportunities and risks and adjust their portfolios accordingly.  Shifts from one phase of the business cycle to the next have historically taken place every few months or years on average. With the global monetary tightening cycle almost over... Читать дальше...

Brazilian oil and gas company Enauta may soon change the face of Latin American fossil fuels by establishing an independent oil and gas company with 3R Petroleum Óleo e Gás. This is the most recent of several ambitious moves by Enauta to expand its oil and gas operations in Brazil. In recent months, the firm has signed several contracts to acquire stakes in multiple offshore oilfields in the region, thereby boosting its production capacity. The proposal to merge with 3R, if accepted, could lead to... Читать дальше...

When the European Union approved its Green Deal, it was done to much fanfare and sparkles. Now, the fanfare and the sparkles are a distant memory as the EU grapples with the actual “how” of the transition equation it wrote for itself. Being quiet on the real costs of the transition push has not helped it, either. It’s not that the EU is not admitting the transition would be costly. The European Council calls the necessary investment “enormous”. It also says that the EU had set aside some 580 billion... Читать дальше...

For weeks, now, British editors, letter writers and resident economic thinkers in the government have been debating how to preserve Thames Water as an investor-owned entity. We might ask, “Why bother?”, but if you are a British neo-liberal intellectual, the superiority of private ownership is dogma, so don’t ask. And if you are in the energy business, you might ask why you should care? To which we would answer that some energy consumers soon may ask what advantage private ownership confers on their energy suppliers... Читать дальше...