Price changes for Thursday, December 28th, 2017

Hi to all,

Here’s what I have for this Thursday’s price changes. Due to the fact that there was no published data for today’s trading, I have made a best “guesstimate” that is probably low, based on the performance of oil today.

*Heating and stove oils show an increase of 1.1 cents a litre.

*Diesel shows an increase of 1.5 cents a litre, and...

*Gasoline shows an increase of 3.4 cents a litre.

Market highlights

Libyan disruption bites markets today

Oil showed a steady increase to day as an important Libyan pipeline went up in flames taking close to 100,000 barrels of exports offline in a tightening oil market. Brent crude rose almost $1.20 US a barrel on the news.

Gasoline inventories up, but not a lot

Gasoline inventories showed another increase in inventory levels, but with rising capacity of close on 94%, it didn’t rise as compared to the two weeks previous. That signalled an increase in demand ahead of the important Christmas travel season. Demand was shown to have increased as gasoline only increased in inventories by 1.7 million barrels compared to the previous weeks’ 5.4 million barrel build.

That’s it for this week!

Regards,

George Murphy

Price changes for Thursday, December 21st, 2017

Hi to all,

Here's what I have for price changes for this Thursday:

*Heating/stove oils show an increase of 2/10ths of a cent a litre.
*Diesel fuel shows down a half cent, and...
*Gasoline shows a drop of 1.7 cents a litre.

Merry Christmas to us, wa?...

Market highlights

Inventories increase again
U.S EIA inventories of gasoline increased again last week as gasoline demand remained a little weak ahead of the Christmas travel season and refiner capacity remained high.
Gasoline inventories showed a gain of 5.7 million barrels against a draw of 5.1 million barrels of crude, but refiner capacity remained high at 93.4 percentage points.
Distillates dropped in 1.4 million barrels as winter demand remains a factor in support of heating and stove oil prices.

Canadian dollar slips
The Canadian dollar slipped against it's chief competitor over the past week as the U.S Greenback showed some strength over the last week and a half, losing close on a penny against the U.S buck.

I'll leave it at that for this week. I'll still be here over Christmas as long as the trading continues. Numbers may be off slightly with the markets closed for so many days, but we'll try to be as accurate as possible for the trip home.

Be safe out there! Enjoy your time with family and leave the keys if you plan on "celebrating" the Epiphany!

Regards,

George and family

Twitter @GeorgeMurphyOil 

Price changes for Thursday, December 14, 2017

Hi to all,

Here’s what I have for this week’s price changes:

*Heating and stove oils show no change in prices this week.

*Diesel fuel shows an increase of a half penny (5/10ths) a litre, and...

*Gasoline shows a drop of a half penny a litre.

Market highlights

U.S domestic output continues to grow

U.S inventory reports from the Energy Information Administration show that U.S domestic oil output has again showed an increase by another 25,000 barrels a day, putting domestic output at 9.707 million barrels a day.

            But domestic output has been lagging a little in spite of it’s own growth. While steady upwards, it hasn’t been robust. Some speculate that there’s a need for junior producers to steady their finances before the drill-bits go in the ground. But the real reason my be a booming U.S economy.

           While the economy has been busy the last few years, oil prices collapsed throwing many out of the oil patch and into other areas of the transportation sector. Simple fact may be that people aren’t as quick to enter into a sector of the economy that may collapse again and that could be the issue.

U.S inventories report

U.S crude inventories were down in the same report, showing crude down by 5.6 million barrels with refiner capacity up to 93.8 percentage points.

            U.S gasoline inventories were up by 6.8 million barrels, while distillate inventories climbed by 1.7 million barrels.

            Gasoline prices hardly moved over the reporting period with gas inventories offsetting crude oil losses.

That’s it for this week!

Regards,

George Murphy

Twitter @GeorgeMurphyOil

Price changes for Thursday, December 7th, 2017

Hi to all,

Here’s what I have for price changes for this week:

*Heating and stove oils both show no changes.

*Diesel fuel shows a drop of a half penny, and...

*Gasoline shows a drop of 1.5 cents a litre.

Market highlights

OPEC and non-OPEC producers extend production cuts

Meetings of OPEC and non-OPEC members on Thursday past were deemed to be successful by the group as both sides saw an extension of a cuts agreement extended until the end of 2018 from March of 2018.

     Non-OPEC members were also in agreement as the cuts both groups Implimented were seen to be a successful measure in chewing into a world over-supply of oil.

     Non-OPEC members agreed to add 600,000 barrels a day in cuts to add to OPEC’s 1.2 million barrels a day brought in November of 2016.

Markets wait and see

While OPEC and non-OPEC members were successful in reaching an agreement on cuts, market traders were left to wonder at how much U.S domestic output will respond to fill the gaps in output left by the cuts.

     While U.S domestic output is seeing constant growth, so far it has been sporadic as financial issues around any possible collapse has some showing some caution as they get drill-bits into the ground.

      Other cite the simple problem of getting people back into the oil workforce after the market collapse of 2014 drove many to other sectors of a booming U.S economy.

       Oil prices have remained close to $63 US for Brent for the last few days since the meetings.

That’s it for this week!

Regards,

George Murphy
Twitter @GeorgeMurphyOil