Hi to all,
Here’s what I have
for price changes for this Thursday, August 6th, 2020...
*Heating, stove oil
and Diesel all show a drop of 1.1 cents a litre, and...
*Gasoline shows a
drop of 3 cents a litre.
Market highlights
Covid continues to
choke demand
Just when they
thought it was safe to go back to their drill bits...
News of any potential increase in oil prices continues to be tempered by
continuing outbreaks of Covid-19 worldwide, especially in the United States as
Covid-19 seems to be a huge factor in any economic recovery.
Word of several outbreaks in Australia, Germany, Spain and the US continues to
keep a hold of any meteoric rise in oil prices and demand for most distillates
as well as gasoline, has been flattened.
And
with the end of summer coming quick, further drops in demand for transportation
fuels, including gasoline, is highly likely.
Early winter
outlook
With the summer
drawing to a close for some, bets on gasoline by speculators usually switches
to distillates, like heating oil as the fall and winter seasons contracts
approach.
The colder the weather, the more demand for distillates.
A look at the data shows heating and stove oil spot prices a rather tidy 13
cents a litre lower than the same timeframe for last year, and if oil prices
remaining relatively flat over the next few months, then consumers can expect
to pay up to 79 cents a litre, down from the 92.9 they paid at peak winter
pricing last year in the immediate St. John’s area.
However, with Covid-19 holding the possibility of further shutdowns in the
future that may keep everyone close to home, demand may increase to close that
gap between this year and last year’s pricing.
I’ll continue to keep an eye to it all!
US inventory data
The Energy
Information Administration’s latest inventory data is out, and it shows a drop
of 10.6 million barrels, leaving inventories of crude a full 17 percent above
last years levels.
Gasoline showed an increase of 700,000 barrels, while distillates were also
reported up slightly, but by 500,000 barrels.
Refiner capacity was recorded at 79.5 percent.
US domestic production remained steady at 11.1 million barrels a day.
The Baker-Hughes rig count remained at 251 operating rigs, but down from the
946 that were operating at the same time last year, a drop of close to 75
percent.
That’s it for this
week!
Regards,
George Murphy
Twitter
@GeorgeMurphyOil
