Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 (edited) 3 hours ago, El Nikko said: I would serious hope at this point that anyone with half a brain knows that ISIS isn't some bunch of random muslim terrorists and rather a proxy army funded by many states. No kidding! The US, Gulf States, Turkey and Israel played a strong role in creating and perpetuating ISIS. Who is Really Behind ISIS? (transcript) VIDEO and Transcript - https://www.corbettreport.com/who-is-really-behind-isis-transcript/ Edited February 12, 2021 by Tom Nolan 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 Planning 500,000 charging points for EVs by 2025, Shell becomes the latest company swept up in EV charging boom TechCrunch - Feb 11th https://finance.yahoo.com/news/planning-500-000-charging-points-154918452.html Shell's plan to roll out 500,000 electric charging stations in just four years is the latest sign of an EV charging infrastructure boom that has prompted investors to pour cash into the industry and inspired a few companies to become public companies in search of the capital needed to meet demand. Since the beginning of the year, three companies have been acquired by special purpose acquisition vehicles and are on a path to go public, while a third has raised tens of millions from some of the biggest names in private equity investing for its own path to commercial viability. The SPAC attack began in September when an electric vehicle charging network ChargePoint struck a deal to merge with special purpose acquisition company Switchback Energy Acquisition Corporation, with a market valuation of $2.4 billion. The company's public listing will debut February 16 on the New York Stock Exchange. In January, EVgo, an owner and operator of electric vehicle charging infrastructure, agreed to merge with the SPAC Climate Change Crisis Real Impact I Acquisition for a valuation of $2.6 billion — a huge win for the company's privately held owner, the power development and investment company LS Power. LS Power and EVgo management, which today own 100% of the company, will be rolling all of its equity into the transaction. Once the transaction closes in the second quarter, LS Power and EVgo will hold a 74% stake in the newly combined company. One more deal soon followed. Volta Industries agreed to merge this month with Tortoise Acquisition II, a tie-up that would give the charging company named after battery inventor Alessandro Volta a $1.4 billion valuation. The deal sent shares of the SPAC company, trading under the ticker SNPR, rocketing up 31.9% in trading earlier this week to $17.01. The stock is currently trading around $15 per share. Not to be outdone, private equity firms are also getting into the game. Riverstone Holdings, one of the biggest names in private equity energy investment, placed its own bet on the charging space with an investment in FreeWire. That company raised $50 million in a new round of funding earlier this year. "The writing is on the wall and the investors have to take the time. There’s been a flight out of the traditional investment opportunities in markets," said FreeWire chief executive Arcady Sosinov, in an interview. "There’s been a flight out of the oil and gas companies and out of the traditional utilities. You have to look at other opportunities... This is going to be the largest growth opportunity of the next 10 years." FreeWire deploys its infrastructure with BP currently, but the company's charging technology can be rolled out to fast food companies, post offices, grocery stores or anywhere people go and spend somewhere between 20 minutes and an hour. With the Biden administration's plan to boost EV adoption in federal fleets, post offices actually represent another big opportunity for charging networks, Sosinov said. Jonathan Shieber Thu, February 11, 2021, 9:49 AM·4 min read Shell's plan to roll out 500,000 electric charging stations in just four years is the latest sign of an EV charging infrastructure boom that has prompted investors to pour cash into the industry and inspired a few companies to become public companies in search of the capital needed to meet demand. Since the beginning of the year, three companies have been acquired by special purpose acquisition vehicles and are on a path to go public, while a third has raised tens of millions from some of the biggest names in private equity investing for its own path to commercial viability. The SPAC attack began in September when an electric vehicle charging network ChargePoint struck a deal to merge with special purpose acquisition company Switchback Energy Acquisition Corporation, with a market valuation of $2.4 billion. The company's public listing will debut February 16 on the New York Stock Exchange. In January, EVgo, an owner and operator of electric vehicle charging infrastructure, agreed to merge with the SPAC Climate Change Crisis Real Impact I Acquisition for a valuation of $2.6 billion — a huge win for the company's privately held owner, the power development and investment company LS Power. LS Power and EVgo management, which today own 100% of the company, will be rolling all of its equity into the transaction. Once the transaction closes in the second quarter, LS Power and EVgo will hold a 74% stake in the newly combined company. One more deal soon followed. Volta Industries agreed to merge this month with Tortoise Acquisition II, a tie-up that would give the charging company named after battery inventor Alessandro Volta a $1.4 billion valuation. The deal sent shares of the SPAC company, trading under the ticker SNPR, rocketing up 31.9% in trading earlier this week to $17.01. The stock is currently trading around $15 per share. Not to be outdone, private equity firms are also getting into the game. Riverstone Holdings, one of the biggest names in private equity energy investment, placed its own bet on the charging space with an investment in FreeWire. That company raised $50 million in a new round of funding earlier this year. "The writing is on the wall and the investors have to take the time. There’s been a flight out of the traditional investment opportunities in markets," said FreeWire chief executive Arcady Sosinov, in an interview. "There’s been a flight out of the oil and gas companies and out of the traditional utilities. You have to look at other opportunities... This is going to be the largest growth opportunity of the next 10 years." FreeWire deploys its infrastructure with BP currently, but the company's charging technology can be rolled out to fast food companies, post offices, grocery stores or anywhere people go and spend somewhere between 20 minutes and an hour. With the Biden administration's plan to boost EV adoption in federal fleets, post offices actually represent another big opportunity for charging networks, Sosinov said. President Joe Biden commits to replacing entire federal fleet with electric vehicles "One of the reasons we find electrification of mobility so attractive is because it’s not if or how, it's when," said Robert Tichio, a partner at Riverstone in charge of the firm's ESG efforts. "Penetration rates are incredibly low… compare that to Norway or Northern Europe. They have already achieved double-digit percentages." A recent Super Bowl commercial from GM featuring Will Farrell showed just how far ahead Norway is when it comes to electric vehicle adoption. "The demands on capital in the electrification of transport will begin to approach three quarters of a trillion annually," Tichio said. "The short answer to your question is that the needs for capital now that we have collectively, politically, socially economically come to a consensus in terms of where we’re going and we couldn’t say that 18 months ago is going to be at a tipping point." Shell already has electric vehicle charging infrastructure that it has deployed in some markets. Back in 2019 the company acquired the Los Angeles-based company Greenlots, an EV charging developer. And earlier this year Shell made another move into electric vehicle charging with the acquisition of Ubitricity in the U.K. “As our customers’ needs evolve, we will increasingly offer a range of alternative energy sources, supported by digital technologies, to give people choice and the flexibility, wherever they need to go and whatever they drive,” said Mark Gainsborough, executive vice president, New Energies for Shell, in a statement at the time of the Greenlots acquisition. “This latest investment in meeting the low-carbon energy needs of US drivers today is part of our wider efforts to make a better tomorrow. It is a step towards making EV charging more accessible and more attractive to utilities, businesses and communities.” 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22652-crude-supply-crunch-oil-major-total-sees-10-million-bpd-supply-gap-in-2025/ https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22652-crude-supply-crunch-oil-major-total-sees-10-million-bpd-supply-gap-in-2025/ 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Russian-Oil-Giant-Rosneft-Sees-Profits-Slide-79-In-2020.html Russian Oil Giant Rosneft Sees Profits Slide 79% In 2020 By Irina Slav - Feb 12, 2021, 9:00 AM CST Join Our Community Rosneft reported a 79-percent drop in 2020 net profits to $2.2 billion (147 billion rubles), with its fourth-quarter result hitting a record high after a loss in the third quarter. The company said its free cash flow had remained positive for the ninth year in a row in 2020 despite the challenging demand situation on global oil markets. It also boasted a decline in production costs to $2.6 per barrel of oil equivalent in the fourth quarter of the year. “The pandemic of new coronavirus infection led to an unprecedented drop in crude oil demand,” chief executive Igor Sechin said. “The volatility of oil prices was at a critical level. At the same time, Rosneft fulfilled its obligations to balance market demand and supply as requested by the Russian Government.” Rosneft’s CEO has been a vocal critic of Russia’s OPEC+ obligations under the deal aimed at curbing the excess supply of oil in an environment of demand destruction amid the pandemic. The company has ambitious production growth plans despite forecasts for a looming demand peak. Its latest move in this direction was the launch of the giant Vostok oil project in the Arctic, which is scheduled to be pumping some 600,000 bpd by 2024, or a total of 30 million tons by that year. According to plans, this should rise to 50 million tons during the second phase of the project, or 1 million bpd, and 100 million tons during its third phase, or 2 million barrels daily. At the release of the 2020 results, Sechin noted the Vostok project as part of the company’s focus on “large projects which are low cost, high-margin, with high-quality resources and a low carbon footprint.” Vostok is estimated to draw investments of $170 billion over ten years, tapping reserves estimated at 44 billion barrels of oil equivalent. By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Oil-Rally-Stalls-On-Fragile-Demand-Recovery.html Oil Rally Stalls On Fragile Demand Recovery By Tsvetana Paraskova - Feb 12, 2021, 10:00 AM CST Join Our Community Oil prices slipped on Friday morning for a second day in a row as major forecasters warned that the global demand recovery is still fragile and as the U.S. dollar strengthened. As of 9:51 a.m. ET on Friday, WTI Crude was down 0.07 percent at $58.24 and Brent Crude prices were trading slightly up by 0.23 percent at $61.33. On Thursday, the International Energy Agency (IEA) warned that the oil market rebalancing looks fragile in the first quarter of 2021, although it continues to be optimistic that global oil stocks will rapidly draw down in the second half of this year as demand rises. This year, world oil demand is expected to grow by 5.4 million barrels per day (bpd) compared to 2020, the agency said in its closely-watched Oil Market Report for February. That's 100,000 bpd lower than the projection in the January report when the IEA expected demand to rise by 5.5 million bpd year over year in 2021. OPEC also warned on Thursday of a weaker start to this year, and expects oil demand to rise by 5.8 million bpd in 2021, down by around 100,000 bpd from last month's projection due to lockdowns in major developed economies in the first half of this year. Oil prices ended on Thursday their nine-day rally—the longest streak of consecutive daily gains in two years—as the market digested the warnings of weak first-quarter demand and as a growing number of analysts said that technical indicators point to overbought conditions. Related: The Most Fragile Oil Price Rally In History Torbjörn Törnqvist, chief executive at one of the world's largest independent oil traders, Gunvor, told Bloomberg last week that oil prices were unlikely to soar much above the $60 per barrel mark, considering that this price level would incentivize a lot of oil supply, including from the United States. Amrita Sen, chief oil analyst at Energy Aspects, doesn't rule out $100 oil next year, but she also believes that in terms of prompt fundamentals, the market has gotten ahead of itself, "because right now demand is still relatively weak." The current oil price strength is dependent "on continued restraint from the OPEC+ group of producers supported by "paper" demand from speculators," Saxo Bank said early on Friday. By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Iran-Is-Facing-A-Stranded-Oil-Asset-Crisis.html Iran Is Facing A Stranded Oil Asset Crisis By Charles Kennedy - Feb 12, 2021, 11:00 AM CST Join Our Community Iran risks having its massive crude oil assets become stranded unless the United States lifts the sanctions that the Trump administrations imposed on Tehran three years ago, Reuters has reported, noting the sanctions have prevented the country from boosting its production capacity as other major producers have done. Iran said last month it was already beginning to ramp up crude oil production in anticipation of the removal of sanctions, but this has yet to happen as the Biden administration has tied the removal to Iran suspending its uranium enrichment program. Exports were also on the rise, oil minister Bijan Zanganeh said in January, noting, "I am not worried about regaining Iran's lost oil market share, and oil buyers do not limit themselves to one or two sellers." If the U.S. sanctions were lifted, he said, "We will return to the market stronger than before, sooner than you might think." According to Reuters' Bozorgmehr Sharafedin and Roslan Khasawneh, Iran doesn't have much time to regain and boost its market share: most oil demand forecasts suggest the world's oil consumption will peak within the next couple of decades. This means Iran will need to quickly adjust to a world that needs a lot less oil but a lot more alternative energy sources, the Reuters authors said. "The dominant narrative is still to keep production optimal long-term - without realising time is running short - and to avoid exporting oil as raw material - without appreciating the refining business may not be a profitable business in the long-term anyway," said Iman Nasseri from energy consultancy FGE, as quoted by Reuters. Iran is among the top five oil producers in the world in terms of reserves and, according to the oil ministry, could ramp up production this year to between 3.9 and 4 million bpd. By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/US-Rig-Count-Continues-To-Climb-Amid-Soaring-Oil-Prices.html U.S. Rig Count Continues To Climb Amid Soaring Oil Prices By Julianne Geiger - Feb 12, 2021, 12:13 PM CST Join Our Community Baker Hughes reported on Friday that the number of oil and gas rigs in the United States rose by 5 last week. The total number of active oil and gas rigs in the U.S. is now 397—or 393 fewer than this time last year. The oil and gas rig count has risen for twelve weeks, during which time the rig count has increased by 87. The oil rig count increased by 7 this week, and the number of gas rigs dipped by 2. The number of miscellaneous rigs remained unchanged. The EIA’s estimate for oil production in the United States for the week ending February 5 was 11.0 million barrels, an increase of 100,000 bpd from the week prior, but still 2.1 million bpd off the all-time high reached last March. Canada’s overall rig count increased this week by 5. Oil and gas rigs in Canada are now at 176 active rigs and down 79 year on year. The Permian basin saw another increase this week in the number of rigs, by 5, bringing the total active rigs in the Permian to 203, or 205 below this time last year. Check back here later for an exclusive early peek at the Frac Spread by Primary Vision. WTI and Brent were both trading up on Friday, with OPEC+ expected to hold production steady for the month of April. At 11:23 a.m. EDT, WTI was trading up 0.53% on the day at $58.55—up nearly $2 per barrel on the week. Brent was trading up 0.82% on the day, at $61.64 up more than $2 per barrel for the week. At a few minutes post-data release, WTI was trading at $59.51, while Brent was trading at $62.64. By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
El Nikko + 2,145 nb February 12, 2021 The Stage Is Set For A Bull Market In Oil BY TYLER DURDEN THURSDAY, FEB 11, 2021 - 21:10 Authored by Dylan Grice via TheMarket.ch, In late 2019, we published a report and recommended an exposure in the oil and especially the oil services sector. Down by over a third since we first did our research back in December of 2019, and down by as much as 70% during the March crash, it has been our worst performing idea by a wide margin. Hence, we felt it was high time for an update. We’ll start by retracing our original idea. Then we’ll try to understand what was missing from it, and why it went so badly for us. We’ll end by bring the idea up-to-date and in so doing, make the case that the oil industry has an essential role to play for coming generations. Yes, energy transition is real and, for what it’s worth, something we are completely in favour of. The question is when it happens, not if it happens, but the implications from it taking several decades rather than several years vary enormously. The cornerstone of our thesis is really that the oil industry is being written off prematurely. From that premise, everything else follows. A shortage of capital In very simple terms, writing in December 2019, as the first reports of a mysterious virus circulating in the Chinese city of Wuhan reached Europe, we felt that the energy slump was behind us. The excesses which had led to the shale crash were being worked out, bankruptcies had soared, and capacity had been reduced. Yet the world still needed oil, and the oil majors were beginning to sanction large projects again. There was a shortage of capital, not opportunity. We also liked the people driving capital allocation in the energy market. In particular, we liked that experienced and successful investors like Sam Zell and John Fredriksen were moving in, self-made billionaires who’d made their fortunes partly by buying things that no one else wanted over the years. On the other side, the «sellers», were politicians, bureaucrats and other non-economically motivated players (primarily ESG-driven investors). We were comfortable that the energy transition was real but concluded that this was a) glacially moving, and importantly, b) a widely understood shift. Oil was still needed in the meantime, and so «low-risk» oil extraction from relatively low-risk short-cycle projects which could be quickly ramped up was more than merely viable, it was essential. Only shale-oil players and the shallow-water projects fit this bill, but we’d had terrible experiences with shale oil producers in the past – they are hopelessly drill-addicted capital misallocators. Shallow-water drillers and servicers were our sweet spot by default. Given the near-term uncertainty in the space, we felt those with strongest balance sheets were best positioned to ride out any remaining volatility. We gave Tidewater and Standard Drilling as examples. What happened? Our thesis was coming good as we started 2020. The majors were increasing their capex targets. Our belief that the lower-risk shallow water deposits would be prime production targets was panning out too, with the number of jack-ups (shallow-water drillers) which were active globally clearly trending higher, in contrast to the activity of floaters (mid-to-deep water drillers) which remained stagnant. Saudi Aramco awarded a string of contracts to Shelf Drilling, the majority of which were for ten years (maturities not seen since the heydays of the offshore drilling boom). But then COVID hit, and the global lockdown led to a cessation of nearly all physical economic activity. There’s no need for us to expand upon just how ugly the macro data was during that time. Weekly US initial jobless claims rising by 244 standard deviations in the middle of March says it all. As far as the energy markets went, the collapse in world oil demand was more muted. The fall from 100 million barrels per day (mbd) to 80 mbd in the three months to April was only a 10 standard deviation event… The world’s energy infrastructure wasn’t designed with such a sudden decline in demand in mind. The physical market was turned on its head as refineries turned away crude oil, as did storage facilities which had no capacity. Financial markets behaviour was even more chaotic with the WTI contract (which is for physical delivery) turning negative in case any of you had forgotten. It seems as though the WTI-tracking ETFs which mechanically roll their futures at the end of each month weren’t paying attention, and as expiry approached, they were the only holders of the May contract. It wasn’t so much panic selling by ETF funds that drove prices into negative territory (although it’s hard to imagine there wasn’t plenty of that too), it was that there were literally no buyers left in the market for that contract. It’s the most concise way we can think of for conveying how utterly chaotic those days were for everyone involved in the oil market. Despite the recovery from those lows, we can still see the effects of the trauma today. The financial panic also reached boardroom level for the oil majors. According to Rystad Energy, 20 bn $ was cut from projected E&P capex by the majors, as the following chart shows. Activity in the jack-up and floater markets also tracked lower once more. Crude prices expected in the medium term, as measured by the rolling sixty-month-out WTI contract, averaged 53 $ before COVID, but have averaged only 45 $ since. And if we look further out, at the rolling one-hundred-twenty-month out WTI contract (i.e. the market's ten year expectation) prices have fallen by around 5 $ in the last few months. That’s only a few dollars higher than the March 2020 liquidity puke. The crude oil market’s verdict is clear: COVID has permanently impaired it. Meanwhile, the market capitalization of Tesla is today roughly the same size as that of the entire S&P 500 Oil sector, which includes the majors, the independents, the drillers, the service companies AND the refiners. So the equity market’s view seems similarly equivocal: oil has no future, the energy transition is here. Three reasons why the oil market has an investable future Except that it isn’t. Or at least according to Bloomberg, which in its annual Electric Vehicle Outlook summary projects that Electric Vehicles (EVs) will only make up around 8% of the total fleet of passenger cars by 2030. Bloomberg expect the number of cars to rise from today’s 1.2 billion vehicles to 1.4 billion, but only for 110 m of them to be EVs. So the number of oil-consuming Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) vehicles on the road by then will still be around 1.3 bn, which is a forecast rise of around 0.7% per year. Moreover, while passenger vehicles contribute around 60% of the global demand for crude oil, the rest comes from heavy duty vehicles, aviation and the petrochemicals industry for which there are as yet, few alternatives. We’re not saying this is a good thing or that it’s something we’re especially happy about, but as investors our job is to allocate capital according to the way we think the world is, not the way we want it to be. And it’s obvious to us that the oil market will continue to play a central role in the global economy in the coming decades. A second fact we think is important to understand is that the transition to EVs is a risk which is widely recognised and understood. BP has gone further than most in pivoting away from hydrocarbons, and very few oil executives are carrying on as normal, or are under any delusion about the reality of their industry. The question isn’t whether or not oil demand peaks, the question is when. Project appraisals and capital allocation factor this in before sign-off. The general trend within the industry is very understandably that of moving towards a perfectly rational risk-aversion. Lower-risk shorter-cycle projects, such as those we already mentioned, in shallow waters or in shale formations are clearly more attractive and easier to sign off on than those in deep waters, even if that’s where the largest deposits are ordinarily expected to be found. Even the gunslingers of the shale patch seem to have gotten this memo. Scott Sheffield, CEO and co-founder of Pioneer Natural Resources, the largest owner of Spraberry acreage in the Permian, told attendees at a recent Goldman Sachs investor call that he didn’t expect much increase in Permian or wider US shale over the next several years, and that the Bakken and Eagle Ford shale regions might never see growth again. As for his own company, the message was clear: «I never anticipate growing above 5% under any conditions. Even if oil went to $100 a barrel and the world was short of supply». The CEO of Devon echoed the sentiments, «I have a hard time seeing the need for U.S. producers over the next several years to get back to double-digit growth. For this management team, if we really think about 2021, let’s keep it flat.» Which brings us neatly to the third point. Global production outside of shale oil has been flat since 2015. All incremental growth was driven by shale. Yet oddly enough, it’s still not quite clear how profitable that growth was. According to Deloitte, the shale industry registered net cumulative free cash flows of negative $300 billion since 2010, impaired more than 450 bn $ of invested capital, and saw more than 190 bankruptcies. Indeed, companies accounting for nearly 50% of shale output are so operationally and financially weak that Deloitte considers them «superfluous». If Deloitte are right, and the shale patch’s newfound aversion to excessive risk sticks, global oil production may well surprise on the downside in coming years. Arguably, the outlook is more bullish for oil today than it was pre-COVID. Regardless, the energy transition isn’t going away. Low-risk, short-cycle barrels will be in relatively higher demand, which argues not only for the higher quality shale assets, but the shallow water players. Which brings us back to where we started: shallow water services. Shallow water drillers in the sweet spot We don’t want to go into too much detail here. But since we discussed Tidewater in our original piece in December 2019, let’s consider it again. You may recall that having acquired Gulfmark it is now the largest listed Offshore Service Vessel (OSV) player and has been through a savage restructuring (G&A reduced by 45%, fleet reduced by 24%). It has an EV of around $500 million, of which net debt is $60 m, no maturities due until August 2022, and expects to generate free cashflow in 2020 of $42 m. The combined EBITDA for Tidewater and Gulfmark in 2014 was $590 m, since then $60 m of cost synergies have been extracted. So call it $650 m peak EBITDA. If they can recover to just half of that, they’ll be at a normalized EBITDA of $325 m. Historically, their EV/EBITDA averaged 7x, but let’s assume that we’re wrong on the relative attractiveness of anything operating in shallow waters, and that anything oil can only expect to trade at a 50% discount compared to its former glories, given the perception that oil is now a permanently shrinking industry. Let’s put that new EBITDA on an EV multiple of 3.5x. That implies an EV of $1.14 bn, which assuming a constant net debt of $60 m implies an equity value of just under $1.1 bn, compared to today’s $440 m. That’s around 2.4x. Of course, if we’re right about the attractiveness of shallow waters, EBITDA could surprise on the upside, and the market could reappraise its view on the sector’s longevity, which would translate into a significant rerating. It’s not difficult to see 4-8x returns here in the coming years. And what happened to the supposed «smart money» which was buying in late 2019? Well, at the risk of stating the obvious, it shows that while skin-in-the-game might be important, it’s not a guarantee of success. Nevertheless, in an interview with CNBC in March of last year – during the teeth of the market rout – Sam Zell said he’d been adding to his energy holdings: «We think the energy space is really cheap … what helps is we were not in the energy space before.»2 John Fredriksen, who has been in the energy space before, remains fully committed, and has recently appointed Tor Andre Svelland to run his interests. The smart money, it seems, is still invested. * * * Dylan Grice is co-founder of Calderwood Capital Research, an investment company specialising in portfolio construction and alternative investments. https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/stage-set-bull-market-oil 2 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
El Nikko + 2,145 nb February 12, 2021 Finally after 6 years Lets GOOOOOOO!!!!! Please 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Kramer + 696 R February 12, 2021 (edited) Thats an awesome article. I'm just trying to figure out 20bn in bbl/d at 50k .... but some nat gas guys like TOU can add barrels at 9-13k/flowing bbl/d So 20B in Saudi production 50k/bbl long life or deep water stuff is 400k bbl d. Vs the cheapest barrels of nat gas as 2mill/d . But averaged out among all production is closer to 800k b/d not being replaced. Also on a per year basis this affords (@400k b/d) 9 million eletric cars or better said: 9 million ICE off the roads. Edited February 12, 2021 by Rob Kramer 1 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 How High Can Oil Prices Go? https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/How-High-Can-Oil-Prices-Go.html By Tom Kool - Feb 12, 2021, 2:00 PM CST Join Our Community Analysts are divided over whether oil prices can continue to climb, with WTI nearing $60 and profit-taking having begun. With 2021 shaping up to be one of the most important years for the energy sector in modern history, there is no better time to become an Oilprice.com premium member. Sign up today to get breaking news, expert analysis, and trading tips. Friday, February 12th, 2021 Brent held above $61 per barrel in early trading on Friday, despite some headwinds from a slight strengthening of the dollar. Analysts are now split on whether or not the rally has gone too far or has more room to run. OPEC cuts oil demand forecast. OPEC expects oil demand to rise by 5.8 million barrels per day (bpd) this year, down by around 100,000 bpd from last month’s projection due to lockdowns in major developed economies in the first half of this year, the cartel said on Thursday. EIA: U.S. shale to grow. The EIA said that with WTI over $50, U.S. shale will return to growth later this year. The agency increased its 2022 supply forecast to 11.53 mb/d, up from 11.49 mb/d last month. S&P cuts credit rating for ExxonMobil. S&P cut ExxonMobil’s (NYSE: XOM) credit rating by one notch to AA- with a negative outlook. The ratings agency cited heavy levels of debt and energy transition risk. Exxon to close its Australian refinery. ExxonMobil (NYSE: XOM) said it would close its 72-year-old Altona refinery in Australia, the nation’s smallest. Once closed, Australia will only have two remaining refineries. Goldman: Upside risk to $65 oil. A broad commodity supercycle is getting underway, creating upside risk to $65 oil, according to Goldman Sachs. “I want to be long oil and hang on for the ride,” Goldman’s Jeff Currie said in an interview with S&P Global Platts on Feb. 5, warning “there is a lot of upside here.” He added: “Is it back to $150/b? I don't know... as it is a macro repricing we are talking about and everything needs to reprice.” Equinor sells of Bakken assets. Equinor (NYSE: EQNR) announced the sale of its Bakken assets for $900 million, after purchasing them for $4.4 billion nearly a decade ago. “We should not have made these investments,” Equinor Chief Executive Officer Anders Opedal said. “The Bakken does not compete.” Related: Oil Prices Continue To Rise As Bullish News Mounts Appalachian fracking boom didn’t lead to prosperity. A new report from the Ohio River Valley Institute finds that despite a natural gas boom over the past decade, the counties in Appalachia that saw the most drilling actually saw worse job growth than elsewhere. The conclusions undercut the notion that the shale gas industry is a job engine. Oil majors trim shale dreams. ExxonMobil (NYSE: XOM), Chevron (NYSE: CVX), and BP (NYSE: BP) have collectively shelved as much as 2.4 mb/d in future oil production plans from U.S. shale, according to an analysis from Energy Intelligence. The strategy overhaul means the majors will focus on cash generation rather than production growth. Excess cash flow will go to paying down debt or otherwise be returned to shareholders. Shell says its production already peaked. Royal Dutch Shell (NYSE: RDS.A) said it would start reducing oil production at a rate of 1 to 2% per year, which would include asset sales. The company said from now on it would allocate 25% of its capex to renewables and marketing, or $5 to $6 billion. Marketing includes retail gasoline stations and lubricants. Morgan Stanley: Gasoline could become worthless. Morgan Stanley says the market may be ascribing zero or even negative value for ICE-derived revenues at GM and Ford and has listed a variety of factors that are likely to transform the companies' once-profitable assets into potentially cash-burning and loss-making businesses. Texas RRC delays flaring decision. The Texas Railroad Commission again delayed a decision on flaring permits, evidence that the regulator is starting to scrutinize flaring plans to a greater degree. Marathon cuts 5% of workforce. Marathon Oil (NYSE: MRO) cut its workforce by 5%, and also cut executive pay. China’s grid firms to buy 40% renewables by 2030. China will require its grid companies to purchase 40% renewable energy by 2030. Rivian aims for IPO this year. EV-startup Rivian is planning to go public this year at a valuation of around $50 billion, which would make it one of the largest IPO’s of the year. Meanwhile, Xos Trucks Inc., another EV builder, is planning to go public with a SPAC with a $2 billion valuation. Macquarie opens $2 billion renewables fund. Macquarie, the world’s largest infrastructure investor, announced that it would open a $2 billion global renewables fund, its second such fund, after strong interest from institutional investors. It will target wind and solar projects in Western Europe, the United States, Canada, Mexico, Japan, Taiwan, Australia, and New Zealand. Libya’s oil port reopens. Libya’s Hariga oil port reopened after a month-long strike, which had cut output by more than half from 320,000 to 120,000 bpd. LG Chem battery dispute could disrupt EV manufacturing. LG Chem filed a trade dispute against SK Innovation for stealing trade secrets. If LG Chem wins, the U.S. may see disrupted imports of battery cells needed for EV manufacturing. Biden admin launches $100 million clean energy funding. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E, announced $100 million in funding for low-carbon technologies. ARPA-E funds high-risk high-reward early-stage technologies. By Tom Kool for Oilprice.com 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 (edited) https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Oil-Prices-Soar-Amid-Rumors-Of-New-Commodities-Supercycle.html Oil Prices Soar Amid Rumors Of New Commodities Supercycle By ZeroHedge - Feb 12, 2021, 1:00 PM CST Join Our Community Just days after one of our favorite macro strategists, Dylan Grice, predicted that the stage is set for "a bull market in oil", and JPM quant Marko Kolanovic said a new oil and commodity supercycle has begun, oil is starting to get the message, and has jumped more than 2% on Friday... ... rising to the highest intraday level in more than a year as output curbs from top producers whittle down global inventories, while JPM predicts that an epic systematic short squeeze is about to be unleashed next month in oil (we discussed this earlier this week, and will touch on this shortly again). Oil was set for a second straight weekly gain, as OPEC+ continued to slash output and the group expects a stronger second half of the year, which to Bloomberg indicates "that global inventories will face sharp declines unless the cartel boosts supply." Indeed, Iraq said OPEC+ is unlikely to change its output policy at a March meeting. Meanwhile, in the U.S., crude stockpiles are at the lowest in nearly a year. Related: The Most Fragile Oil Price Rally In History “This time of year, there’s usually builds,” said Bill O’Grady, executive vice president at Confluence Investment Management in St. Louis. "The draws we’ve been getting are pretty surprising, setting up a really bullish backdrop.” As a result of the rally, WTI futures' 14-day Relative Strength Index (RSI) rose to the most overbought since 1999 this week and remains above 70 in a sign that the commodity may be due for a pullback, which however has yet to come. “Based on fundamental analysis, the case for further price gains is hard to make, although we are seeing optimism in financial markets in general,” said Hans van Cleef, senior energy economist at ABN Amro. “We think that much higher oil prices are not sustainable and that oil producers will then start to increase production.” Maybe... but maybe they are. Skepticism aside, a recent bullish trade reco by Goldman was validated as Brent prompt timespreads widened in a bullish backwardation structure, helping to unwind bloated stockpiles held in onshore tanks and on ships. The nearest timespread traded as strong as 55 cents a barrel, while swaps tied to the North Sea physical market flipped from a discount to a premium. Meanwhile, concerns about global demand remain with the Covid-19 pandemic crimping fuel consumption from China to the U.S. On Thursday the IEA again cut its demand forecast for 2021, describing the market as fragile. However, oil has recovered from the depths of the pandemic (after briefly trading as negative as -$43/bbl on April 20). Related: Iran’s Geopolitical Powerplay Continues With Iraqi Oil Deals That said, a recovery from the pandemic could lead to outsized gains in oil: according to BofA, oil demand could rise at the fastest pace since the 1970s over the next three years, which could send oil prices soaring. “Inflation fears are increasing rapidly and there is a historic amount of capital filtering through global financial markets due to all of the stimulus programs,” Ryan Fitzmaurice, commodities strategist at Rabobank, said in a note. Large inflows into the space “speak to the fact that investors want to own commodities at the moment and are willing to overlook some of the weaker fundamental inputs to focus on the bigger picture at hand.” Finally, let's not forget that for the Fed the oil price surge is music to their ear for the simple reason that one of the biggest drivers of 10Y breakevens... [IMAGE]... is the price of oil. And if there is one thing the Fed wants more than anything, is to create the impression that inflation is about to overheat, forcing Americans to start spending. It might be working: earlier today the latest UMich report found that 1-Year inflation expectations surged to the highest level since 2014... By Zerohedge.com Edited February 12, 2021 by Tom Nolan 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
El Nikko + 2,145 nb February 12, 2021 Oil was the ginger stepchild of commodities Until it wasn't 3 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 12, 2021 Well, according to JPMorgan's Marko Kolanovic, such a squeeze may soon be coming to commodities in general and oil in particular. Recall that on Wednesday, JPM's famous quant, Marko Kolanovic argued that ""the new commodity upswing, and in particular Oil up cycle, has started" https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/jpmorgan-predicts-biggest-short-squeeze-yet-begins-next-month JPMorgan Predicts That The Biggest Short Squeeze Yet Begins Next Month by Tyler Durden Friday, Feb 12, 2021 - 13:20 While markets, regulators and even Maxine Waters have been obsessing over the various rolling short squeezes orchestrated by Reddit and Robinhood raiders (with or without the help of hedge funds who ended up being the biggest beneficiaries of the Gamestop surge) which first targeted the most shorted mid-cap names, before moving to biotechs, pot stocks and eventually pennystocks, the reality is that such squeezes are tiny in the grand scheme of things for two reasons: with stocks trading at record highs, overall short interest across equities is at all time lows... ... so one needs to do highly targeted campaigns looking only for illiquid small and mid-cap names which have a very high short interest to float ratio, and second the real systematic shorts are to be found not in stocks but futures and specifically commodities; after all the original widow-maker trader refers not to Gamestop but to nat gas, where as we showed yesterday moves tend to be fast, furious and especially brutal (just ask Amaranth's Brian Hunter). In fact, anyone who was short any midcontinent nat gas overnight is now out of business. We bring all this up because while equity squeezes - while dramatic and exciting - tend to go as quickly as they come, the real squeezes in commodities tend to last for a long, long time especially if they are accompanied by a shift in sentiment. Well, according to JPMorgan's Marko Kolanovic, such a squeeze may soon be coming to commodities in general and oil in particular. Recall that on Wednesday, JPM's famous quant, Marko Kolanovic argued that ""the new commodity upswing, and in particular Oil up cycle, has started" ... a very contrarian thesis to the prevailing conventional wisdom that oil - which is clearly overbought after soaring more than 50% since November - may soon resume its slide if and when more covid-related shutdowns return, and one which was predicted on a series of fundamental factors which he laid out below. And after all, just 10 months ago WTI was trading at a negative $43 per barrel, an experience that has scarred a generation of oil bulls for life. To be sure, Kolanovic listed a variety of fundamental drivers behind his highly contrarian call, among which... ... of which he noted postpandemic recovery (‘roaring 20s’), ultra-loose monetary and fiscal policies, weak USD, stronger inflation, and unintended consequences of environmental policies and their friction with physical constraints related to energy consumption and production." as the key ones. He may or may not be right - after all commodities (and macro) is hardly Kolanovic's specialty. But what grabbed our attention, and what Kolanovic truly excels at, was his views on the upcoming dramatic shift in technicals and flows in the commodity sector. Specifically, while the fundamental factors may well support a "sypercycle" thesis, any true commodity surge would require a buying catalyst spark. And according to Kolanovic this will come in the form of quant, momentum and other systematic investors being forced to start covering - initially slowly and then faster and faster - what is a historic short across the energy sector. The timing of this squeeze? One month from today. Here's why: In a market where - occasional reddit-inspired microcap short squeeze aside - algos and CTAs have established themselves as the dominant price-setters, it is hardly a surprise that Kolanovic - whose specialty after all is precisely derivative and futures flows - focuses on their influence as the driver behind a commodity supercycle. Indeed, he writes that after "CTAs played significant role in the 2014 oil price downturn" more recently, "CTA funds have been adding Energy exposure. The reason is that 12-month momentum turned positive on Oil, and going forward signals will remain solidly positive." However, this is in the context of a huge systematic net short overhang in the energy sector. In other words, energy - in all forms be it oil or energy stocks - remains the most hated sector across all investors. And since vol-control funds are some of the dumbest money around and their actions can be anticipated well in advance, JPM notes that "a further decline in volatility will likely result in larger and more stable cross-asset quant allocations. A larger momentum impact may affect Energy equities, which is the only sector that still has a strongly negative momentum signal and is hence heavily shorted in the context of factor investing." Indeed, until recently, oil was the only asset that was still below its covid pandemic highs. But, not any more with Brent having finally risen above its pre-pandemic highs. That - and this is the punchline of Kolanovic's thesis - will "change in mid-March, when the momentum signal for energy equities turns positive" which is also a gentle hint from the JPM quant to all the redditors out there: if you want to spark a truly historic short squeeze, one which forces systematic shorts to not only cover but to go long, do it where it hurts and buy some energy stocks. Kolanovic was kind enough to even give you the timing: you have about a month to do so because JPM's model momentum factor "will need to rebalance in March by closing ~20% of its allocation to Energy equity shorts, and adding ~2% to energy longs, for a ~22% net buying in Energy." What is the quantitative significance of these flows? Well, the Croatian quant calculates that if one roughly assumes that there is about ~$1Tr in equity long-short quant funds and that half of these funds are not sector neutralized, "the flows could be quite significant, roughly $20-$30bn." It could be far, far more. As shown in the chart below, the ratio of energy shares shorted vs all other S&P 500 shares shorted, closely followed the commodity supercycle. And, remarkably, the most recent number of shares shorted for energy was 4 times the S&P 500 average. In other words, one doesn't even need to squeeze the shorts: come March - absent some major new crisis - as a result of broader market technicals the existing systematic shorts will quietly start closing them on their own and go long, in the process injecting tens of billions of new capital. And then, once retail, passive and institutional accounts - all of whom have a record low allocation to energy... ... jump on board once the momentum gets going, there's no telling how high oil could go although judging by this week's surge in crude which is clearly frontrunning the "supercycle" the thesis laid out by Kolanovic, the answer is "very." 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tomasz + 1,608 February 12, 2021 From what I read on the Internet, last week reportedly the demand for propane / butane in the US was 2 million barrels a day, which is roughly the demand for oil in Germany. Let me cite this as an example of how severe winter while Americans work remotely from home affects oil demand during the 2020/2021 winter. 2 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Kramer + 696 R February 13, 2021 The Thames froze . Wheres @ronwagn?! I'm seeing txts from bosses telling drillers to shut down the CNG equipment because its costing too much! Nat gas lives !!! Recprd breaking draws coming. And oil well we knew. 1 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ronwagn + 6,290 February 13, 2021 55 minutes ago, Rob Kramer said: The Thames froze . Wheres @ronwagn?! I'm seeing txts from bosses telling drillers to shut down the CNG equipment because its costing too much! Nat gas lives !!! Recprd breaking draws coming. And oil well we knew. Isn't it a lot cheaper than electricity, gasoline, or diesel? 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Kramer + 696 R February 13, 2021 8 hours ago, ronwagn said: Isn't it a lot cheaper than electricity, gasoline, or diesel? If you follow spot prices . Or just look (i know Twitter is evil) Javier Blas has some peak spot prices tracked. Javier Blas @JavierBlas Replying to @JavierBlas In another key regional hub, Waha in West Texas, natural gas prices soared today to $164 per mBtu today. Remember that the Waha hub saw negative prices multiple times in 2019 and 2020 (as low as -$4.6 per mBtu) due to booming Permian shale gas production. 3 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ronwagn + 6,290 February 13, 2021 That is what happens when oil and natural gas is neglected for renewables. Biden will be forced to face the truth. 2 2 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 13, 2021 3 hours ago, Rob Kramer said: If you follow spot prices . Or just look (i know Twitter is evil) Javier Blas has some peak spot prices tracked. Javier Blas @JavierBlas Replying to @JavierBlas In another key regional hub, Waha in West Texas, natural gas prices soared today to $164 per mBtu today. Remember that the Waha hub saw negative prices multiple times in 2019 and 2020 (as low as -$4.6 per mBtu) due to booming Permian shale gas production. I loved reading this Bloomberg article about some fellas who had NatGas wells in Oklahoma. They grabbed a torch and unfroze the pipeline and are making some big bucks, enough to pay off their investment. I own mineral rights there in the SCOOP/STACK of Oklahoma. As Freeze Grips U.S., One Gas Producer Rushes to ‘Open the Taps’ https://finance.yahoo.com/news/freeze-grips-u-one-gas-050001188.html Fri, February 12, 2021, 11:00 PM·4 min read Rachel Adams-Heard https://community.oilprice.com/topic/21940-united-states-lng-exports-reach-third-place/?page=7#comment-147513 1 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 13, 2021 At the 14:22 mark, this Professional Trader discusses OIL PRICES. He says that the scuttlebutt is that Saudi Arabia does NOT want oil prices to go much over $60 because then it destabilizes the market. QUEUED VIDEO (about one or two minute viewing) https://youtu.be/PBm4MGCSUeM?t=862 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 13, 2021 Thousand-Dollar Friday – Our Futures Shorts Pay off Nicely! https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2021-02-12/thousand-dollar-friday-our-futures-shorts-pay-nicely Friday, Feb 12, 2021 - 18:03 By Phil of Phil's Stock World Are we having fun yet? In Wednesday's Live Trading Webinar, we discussed using $58.50 as a shorting line for Oil (/CL) Futures and we had a couple of small dips but we finally caught the big one this morning. We don't need to be so quick to jump back on and re-short as we'll certainly get a strong bounce AND it's a holiday weekend -- so "THEY" are as likely to drive us back to $58.50 as they are to panic out and sell. That's why, last Friday, we went with the Ultra-Short Oil ETF (SCO), picking up the March $9 calls at 0.65 -- to play for the post-holiday drop without having to worry about the Futures over the weekend. Those calls dropped to 0.55 on Thursday, as oil topped out, but finished the day at 0.72 and we have 35 days left to play, looking to make 0.25 x 50 contracts at 0.90 is $1,500 on our $3,250 outlay (50 contracts in our Short-Term Portfolio). [ARTICLE CONTINUES - Actually this is a Promotional piece using a paid slot at Zero Hedge) Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Kramer + 696 R February 13, 2021 1 hour ago, Tom Nolan said: At the 14:22 mark, this Professional Trader discusses OIL PRICES. He says that the scuttlebutt is that Saudi Arabia does NOT want oil prices to go much over $60 because then it destabilizes the market. QUEUED VIDEO (about one or two minute viewing) https://youtu.be/PBm4MGCSUeM?t=862 Conversation Dr. Gary N. Ross @kingofcrude Consolidate is reasonable but oil price will inevitably move to where Saudis want it to go which is at least $5 higher. Supply is not increasing but dem is, esp with easing lockdowns and cold, while stocks are declining. +Iran has to be more aggressive to get Biden’s attention! 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Kramer + 696 R February 13, 2021 Sorry I gotta go with the king! And the weather. 1 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tom Nolan + 2,443 TN February 14, 2021 Australia Is Growing Dangerously Dependent On Foreign Fuel By Tsvetana Paraskova - Feb 13, 2021, 2:00 PM CST https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Australia-Is-Growing-Dangerously-Dependent-On-Foreign-Fuel.html Join Our Community The pandemic has accelerated refinery closures globally as refiners and oil majors acknowledge that some sites have become permanently uneconomical amid depressed refining margins, fierce regional competition, and expectations of declining road fuel demand in the long term. For many countries, the closing of refining capacity means increased dependence on imports and heightened risk of fuel supply disruption in case of a major regional or world conflict. Nowhere is this more evident now than in Australia, which will soon find itself with just two operating refineries, including one under review for potential closure, compared to eight operational sites 20 years ago. Due to its geographical position, Australia has lost the competition in the refining business as small and old refineries cannot rival the booming oil processing capacity in Asia, particularly China and India. Also due to its location, Australia—with reduced refining capacity—will increase its dependence on fuel imports from Asia, including from China, relations with which have deteriorated significantly over the past months, severely affecting energy trade. Governments need to realize that the importance of refineries as strategic assets of national security has diminished since World War II, and an all-out global conflict with today’s warfare capabilities would cut not only fuel imports to oil-importing nations but also crude flows, Reuters columnist John Kemp argues. In case of a war, refineries in countries dependent on crude imports would be worth nothing if blockades of shipments and shipping lanes cut off crude flows to feed those refineries, Kemp says. This may be true in case of a global armed conflict, but Australia, due to its proximity to China, is thinking about its national security even when a refinery with a processing capacity of just 90,000 barrels per day (bpd) closes. Related: Rosneft Stake Becomes Headache For Oil Major BP This will happen when ExxonMobil converts its Altona refinery into an import terminal. The refinery is no longer considered economically viable, the U.S. corporation said this week, in the second such announcement from a supermajor in just a few months, following BP’s decision to cease production at the Kwinana refinery in Western Australia and convert it to a fuel import terminal. The U.S.-China trade war and the Australia-China geopolitical and trade spat of recent months, as well as the heightened uncertainty on global energy markets in the pandemic, is exacerbating the national security challenge for Australia. The country will have two more import terminals and two fewer refineries, which will inevitably raise its import dependence. The refinery closures also highlight the wobbling energy strategy of Australia’s government, which has yet to draft a comprehensive plan how to adapt the world’s top coal exporter to the challenges posed by climate change, according to Reuters columnist Clyde Russell. Australia has a strong pipeline of solar and wind power projects, which could help it achieve the fastest transition to an overwhelming share of renewable sources in its energy mix, according to data and analytics company GlobalData. However, growing shares of renewable electricity will not mask the fuel import dependence. So Australia will need to import more fuel and will likely import it from those new large regional refineries that have killed its small decades-old facilities. “The continued growth of large-scale, export-oriented refineries throughout Asia and the Middle East has structurally changed the Australian market,” BP said in October when it announced the decision to convert the Kwinana refinery into a fuel import terminal. “Having fewer refineries reduces Australia’s ability to refine fuels if shipping and supply chains are ever severely disrupted for any reason in the future,” Dr. Hunter Laidlaw from the Parliamentary Library wrote in December. “Even before these refineries close, more than 90 percent of Australia’s refined fuels are coming from overseas, leaving the nation seriously exposed to any crisis that impacts on maritime supply chains,” Jamie Newlyn, Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) Assistant National Secretary, said after Exxon’s announcement this week. Related Video: The Painful Death Of Coal “If a pandemic, military conflict, natural disasters, or an economic shock cuts the flow of fuel to Australia, the situation would be catastrophic, with every part of the nation grinding to a halt,” Newlyn added. The fact that Australia will likely increase its dependence on Chinese fuel imports is also a concern, especially amid the difficult relations of the two countries in recent months. Australia’s petroleum imports from China have more than doubled over the last five years, Australian energy advisory firm EnergyQuest said this week. A whopping 98 percent of all petroleum sales in Australia in 2019, the last ‘normal’ year, came from imports of crude or refined products. Australia’s imports from China accounted for 14 percent of refined product imports, according to EnergyQuest data. “Australia also imports from Japan, Singapore and Taiwan where there are also cuts to refining capacity so imports from China could increase further, replacing these. A return to “normal” growth in petrol, diesel and jet fuel would also increase Chinese imports,” EnergyQuest said. By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
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