Showing posts with label crude oil prices. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crude oil prices. Show all posts

Saturday, January 23, 2010

Crude Oil Prices Fall Victim to China Syndrome


New measures by Chinese authorities to curb bank lending reversed a rally in energy prices early in the week, bringing West Texas Intermediate futures down more than 4% in the second half of the week to below $75 a barrel by Friday.

China continued its efforts to slow down its economy and prevent overheating, and told some banks to stop making certain kinds of loans. The Chinese move on Wednesday hit all commodities across the board, from gold to lead, with the prospect of slower economic growth in the country.

Not even the news that China’s oil imports in December exceeded 5 million barrels of oil a day for the first time could stop the decline.

U.S. data, meanwhile, showed that demand for oil had slipped 1.8% in the four weeks leading to Jan. 15 from the like period a year ago, when the U.S. economy was in the grip of a recession. Crude inventories declined in the week, against expectations, but gasoline inventories rose. Continued milder weather in the Northeast further dampened heating oil prices.

News that utilization of U.S. refinery capacity fell to its lowest levels since the 1980s drove home the point that demand for distillates was lagging. Refinery utilization in the previous week dropped 2.9 percentage points to 78.4% of the 17.6 million barrels per day total capacity, the lowest level in two decades except for periods when hurricanes shut down refinery operations.

The U.S. and China are the world’s top two oil-consuming countries, so the signs of weakening demand in both were bearish for energy prices.

As if all that wasn’t enough, the announcement by the White House on Thursday of tough new measures to limit banks’ proprietary trading threw a double whammy in energy markets. There were concerns that Wall Street banks, among the biggest energy traders, would have to cut back their activities. Plus, the news sent equities into a tailspin, and dragged down commodities prices.

The uncertainty about U.S. bank restructuring reversed the dollar’s climb against the euro, which had also weighed on crude oil prices. After dropping below $1.41, the euro bounced back up above that level at the end of the week.

But continuing concerns about Greece’s debt and new uncertainty about whether Ben Bernanke will be confirmed for a second term as Federal Reserve chairman supported the dollar and were likely to dampen any strong rise for the euro, analysts said.

By Darrell Delamaide for Oil Price.Com

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Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Hype hype, hype hype Iran

Oil prices got a bid from a rising stock market and concerns over Iran. Now, while some traders and analysts try to hype the Iran story, the truth is the odds of an imminent military conflict with Iran are being greatly exaggerated. And if we do actually get into a conflict, it is unclear as to whether or not it will have a long term impact on oil prices in a world awash in supply.

Many analysts point to the fact that the Iranians have threatened to close the Straits of Hormuz, a major choke point for global supply. The Straits are located between Oman and Iran and connects the Persian Gulf with the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea. According to the Department of Energy, Hormuz is the world's most important oil choke point due to its daily oil flow.....Read the entire article

Sunday, July 12, 2009

U.S. Gasoline Falls to $2.5573 a Gallon, Survey Finds


The average price of regular gasoline at U.S. filling stations fell to $2.5573 a gallon as supplies of the fuel rose and crude oil prices dropped amid weakened demand.
Gasoline dropped 10.4 cents in the two weeks ended July 10, according to a survey of 5,000 filling stations nationwide by Trilby Lundberg, an independent gasoline analyst.
“These lower prices are from lower crude oil prices and from reduced demand from the poor economy,” Lundberg said in an interview today.....Complete Story

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