Hi to all,
Here’s what I have
for this week’s price changes:
*Heating, stove oil
and Diesel all show a drop of 3/10ths of a cent a litre.
*Gasoline shows an
increase of 3.4 cents a litre. This includes the addition of 2.2 cents in
carbon taxes for implementation April 1st.
Nova Scotia: So
far, looks like 1.1 cents a litre.
New Brunswick: 1.1
plus your carbon tax of 2.2 cents a litre.
Market highlights
Ever Given the
“ever giver”
It’s probably the
first time I have heard of one ship having an effect on oil prices like it did,
not to be outdone of course by the Middle East conflicts of the sixties and
seventies that helped elevate the price of oil with disruptions to the Suez
Canal shipping routes.
The
container ship Ever Given has successfully been refloated in the Suez
Canal after six days of cutting the supply route for consumer goods and oil
shipments to Mediterranean and European ports.
Crude
oil prices rose $4 US after the ship went aground, but no signs of a retreat in
oil prices have shown oil to be retreating at the same speed. Oil did retreat
slightly today albeit only by less than $1 US as the Suez Canal went back to
operations after the successful refloating of the Ever Given.
OPEC to maintain
cuts?
OPEC+ countries and
Saudi Arabia are rumoured to be in the mood to maintain their present
production levels until the end of June month, extending the production cuts
that were due to be put back into the markets later in April.
Citing the slow return of the world economy and a slowing vaccine rollout,
Saudi Arabia is not anxious to see any more oil on the markets when it is not
being consumed, so it has expressed willingness to maintain it’s own production
levels and retain their own million barrel cut in support of the other OPEC+
nations.
OPEC+ ministers are due to meet again next week.
Will US shale take
advantage?
US shale production
has been increasing with the steady rise in oil prices, but production has yet
to offset the price.
With the rising price of oil,, domestic production from US shale has risen to
11 million barrels a day, still two million barrels shy of last year’s numbers
for the same timeframe, and 2.5 million shy of the record for US domestic
production set late in 2019.
Shale producers may be set to take advantage of lost production from elsewhere,
including from lost sources of OPEC+ producers.
US measurements of rig counts showed another nine rigs went back to work over
the seven day period last week. While still down considerably from last year,
471 rigs are up and running as of March 26th, with Canadian rigs up
another 11 over the past week.
EIA inventories
The latest US
Energy Information Administration inventory report from last Wednesday showed
crude oil adding another 1.9 million barrels, while gasoline supplies increased
by just 200 thousand barrels.
Signaling warmer weather on the horizon, distillates added 3.8 million
barrels.
Refiner
capacity was reported at 81.6 percent, just four 100ths off the numbers before
the Texas weather event that knocked refineries offline.
That’s it for this
week!
Regards,
George Murphy
Twitter
@GeorgeMurphyOil
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