Entries from Chemicals & The Economy tagged with 'OPEC'
IEA, OPEC, worry about high oil prices and CO2
The new World Energy Outlook from the International Energy Agency (IEA) spells out two major challenges. It: • "Identifies higher oil prices, coupled with the downturn in oil sector investment, as a serious threat to the world economy, just as...
Oil prices slip as floating storage comes onshore
Destocking is now well underway in crude oil markets. This is focused on the vast amounts of floating storage that built up in H1. According to a Financial Times analysis, April saw 56 ships being used for storage, versus a...
Oil prices continue to plateau
Last year, OPEC meetings led to newspaper headlines. But today's session in Vienna seems to have slipped off the radar. Yet the oil market remains as important as ever to chemical companies. As the chart shows, the prime driver for...
OPEC says oil market still "fundamentally weak"
The latest OPEC monthly oil report paints a bearish picture of the market. It expects OPEC to supply 28.4mbd in 2009, down 7.5% from 2008 levels. And it forecasts more of the same for 2010, expecting to supply just 28...
IEA warns on economic downturn, lower oil demand
Crude oil markets have risen 60% in recent months, as traders speculate on a quick V-shaped economic recovery. But there are growing signs that reality, in the shape of evidence of falling US and global oil demand, may be about...
Vitol warns on current oil prices
Vitol are one of the world's largest oil traders. Thus the blog was interested to see their CEO, Ian Taylor, suggesting that the recent rise in oil prices "does not sit comfortably with the currently available supply and demand data"....
OPEC worries about weak oil market fundamentals
Back in April, the blog noted that stock markets had embarked on "their 7th bear market rally since October 2007". So far, it has been the most impressive of them all, with the S&P 500 rising 40% between 6 March...
US oil stocks rise, demand drops, prices rise
Oil prices have been rising steadily over the past few weeks, and are up 20% since the start of the year. Yet US oil inventories have also been rising, and are now at their highest level since July 1993. Stocks...
OPEC seeks to hold oil prices
OPEC Oil Ministers, meeting today, have achieved 80% compliance with their announced production quotas. This is much higher than normal, and owes a lot to the hard-ball tactics played by Saudi Arabia, the world's leading oil producer, in initially allowing...
TOTAL warn on oil supplies
TOTAL's CEO, Christophe de Margerie, has become even more pessimistic on the future of oil supplies. In 2007, when prices were rising, he suggested it would be very difficult for production to reach even 100mbd, versus the 130 mbd or...
IMF says "demand has collapsed", sees "deflation risk"
A year ago, the International Monetary Fund rightly warned that the world was facing a "serious economic slowdown". This week, it has updated its forecasts, and now "expects the global economy to come to a virtual standstill in 2009". This...
Saudi cuts oil output below OPEC quota
Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil producer, now seems to be moving to Phase 2 of its efforts to achieve a $75 - $100bbl price range. As the blog noted in early December, the Saudis' initial tactic was to play...
IEA revises down oil demand
The International Energy Agency (IEA) has cut its estimate of expected global GDP growth in 2009 to just 1.2%. It therefore expects the world to record its first back-to-back annual decline in oil demand since 1982/3. It says oil production...
Oil hits $34/bbl
The blog's oil price forecasts have had a stellar record this year. Last month, with its $70/bbl forecast having been realised, the blog continued to worry about downside risk: "If refiners are forced to cut runs for December, then it...
Saudi plays hard-ball on oil prices
A month ago, with WTI at $70/bbl, the blog suggested that: "If refiners are forced to cut runs for December, then it would be hard for OPEC to cut its own production quickly enough to compensate. In that case, a...
IEA says "world's energy system at crossroads"
The International Energy Agency (IEA) is the global energy watchdog. Its new annual report, just published, says "the world's energy system is at a crossroads", and adds that "current global trends in energy supply and consumption are patently unsustainable". As...
Oil producers at a crossroads
The blog has been thinking about last week's leaked report from the International Energy Agency (IEA). This said that the world needs "to invest $360bn each year until 2030 to replace falling oil production and increase supply". The IEA based...
OPEC cuts production, worries about demand
Two main factors weigh on oil markets. The first, as PetroMatrix note in their latest weekly report, is that speculative players in virtually all commodity markets are being forced to deleverage their positions, and so "the bottom will be dependent...
Oil futures focus on $50/bbl for December
Futures markets are taking an increasingly gloomy view of oil demand. And over the past 2 weeks, the volume of NYMEX contracts to sell crude at $50/bbl has soared 50-fold. But so far, as the blog expected, physical prices have...
OPEC bites the bullet
Events have moved quickly in oil markets in recent days. Last week, when oil was at $80/bbl, the blog argued that OPEC risked having to defend a $50/bbl price, by delaying production cuts until its 18 November meeting. Last night,...
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