Showing posts with label oil market. Show all posts
Showing posts with label oil market. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Phil Flynn: Oil Is Fed UP!


Oil prices still are having a hard time following through on its breakout over $85 a barrel. Obviously you have to respect that fact that the market has broken out yet at the same time, the bulls have to wonder what the market is waiting for.

It is very possible that the market is waiting for reassurance and permission to buy from our very accommodative Federal Reserve. The Fed has been taking baby steps back from the historic payload of economic stimulus and the oil market fears the impact that the removal of stimulus might have on the price of oil. The oil market has never before experienced the artificial amount of stimulation that it has experienced over the last year and so there is no wonder why there may be some angst building as we get closer to the judgment day. We can talk a lot about the demand growth in China but that too is the product of massive government spending. The Chinese spent 586 billion dollars to prop up their economy and it is unlikely that they will be pumping the economy with that kind of money again. Asian stocks fell hard on rising concerns that China, instead of adding stimulus, will actually be taking it away.

Oil just can’t get going because it is worried about the never ending Greece crisis and the concerns over other weak members in the PIIGS zone. Oil is worried about China and it is worried about what the Fed might say. The Fed has raised interest rates and removed most of its emergency lending programs. Now the market wants to know when the rates will start to rise. Every oil trader in the world is waiting for the answer. The removal of stimulus is a bearish oil event just waiting to happen.

If the bulls cannot get reassurance from the Fed maybe they can get it from Schlumberger. Chief Executive Andrew Gould said he feels that oil near $80 a barrel should hold and that customers will boost spending at oil prices near $80 a barrel. "Our customers will loosen their purse strings on high end technology," Gould said during a conference call to discuss the oil field services company's first-quarter earnings.

There is a lot of oil in storage. Bloomberg News reports that, “Traders increased the number of vessels used to store crude oil by 75 percent last week as the potential profit from storage rose, Morgan Stanley said. There were 21 oil tankers storing dirty products last week, 20 of them are very large crude carriers, up from 12 vessels in the previous week, a Morgan Stanley analyst, said in a report yesterday. Among the nine vessels there are four in Iran. About 41 million barrels of oil were stored in the tankers, Morgan Stanley said, enough to meet more than two days of U.S. consumption. That’s up from 24.5 million barrels a week ago.”

We also need to get prepared for the possible market impact from potential sanctions on Iran. I know that the Iran situation is well known that even with their abundant production of oil, they still do not have the refining capacity to produce what they need in refined products. So it is widely expected that any sanctions on the country will be a ban on gasoline. The AFP is reporting that Iran has increased its gasoline by inventories by about 220 million gallons and plans to boost domestic production to offset possible fuel sanctions according to Nooreddin Shahnazi-Zadeh, the head of National Iranian Oil Refining and Distribution. He claims that, "At the moment the volume of Iran's strategic petrol supplies has increased by over a billion liters" and dismissed the threat of sanctions saying, "it is impossible to impose such limitations in the current situation."

Phil can be reached at pflynn@pfgbest.com And as always watch him each day on the Fox Business Network.


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Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Oil Rises Above $72 as Dollar Weakens to Lowest Level This Year


Crude oil rose above $72 a barrel as the dollar dropped to the lowest level against the euro this year before OPEC’s scheduled announcement today that its members will maintain output targets. Oil added to yesterday’s gain of 4.5 percent in New York as the falling U.S. currency spurred investors’ demand for dollar priced assets to hedge against inflation. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries should maintain existing output quotas and improve compliance when it meets, the group’s production-monitoring committee recommended late yesterday. “The oil market is going to remain focused on the dollar and what other commodities do,” said Phil Flynn, vice president of research at PFG Best, a Chicago based brokerage. “We are all expecting OPEC to celebrate where prices are and pay lip service to better compliance in the future”.....Read the entire article

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

OPEC July Output Up 4th Straight Month on Saudi Rise


The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries Tuesday said its members' oil production increased for a fourth straight month in July above the group's production target. The increase, a bearish signal for crude prices, highlights the rising amount of crude various OPEC members are putting into the global market at a time when world oil demand is fading due to the end of the northern hemisphere summer, the peak driving season. In its monthly oil market report, OPEC said output from its 11 members bound by production quotas rose by 105,000 barrels.....Complete Story

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

Oil Falls From Seven Week High on Concern Recent Gains Overdone

Crude oil fell from a seven week high on speculation that gains of 13 percent in the past three days weren’t supported by an improvement in demand. Crude stockpiles in the U.S., the world’s biggest energy consumer, probably increased for a second week, according to a Bloomberg News survey before tomorrow’s Energy Department report. Oil futures declined as equity indexes slipped in Europe, where the Stoxx 600 dropped 0.9 percent. “The actual situation in the oil market doesn’t justify levels about $70,” said Hannes Loacker.....Complete Story

Friday, July 24, 2009

Daily Oil Prices From Master The Markets

The positive correlation between the price of crude and equity markets continues apace with the Dow finally breaching and holding above the 9000 level for the first time since January. This mutual admiration seems determined to ignore the weak oil market fundamentals which has seen gasoline and distillate stocks in the US increasing for a straight sixth week and with unemployment in the US still rising it is difficult to see how quickly this surplus is likely to be consumed. From a technical perspective yesterday's candle on the daily oil prices chart.....Complete Story

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Monday, June 29, 2009

IEA Cuts 5 Year World Oil Demand Outlook on Economy

The International Energy Agency, an adviser to oil consuming nations, cut five-year forecasts for global crude demand because of the economic slump, predicting consumption won’t regain last year’s levels until 2012. The IEA cut its oil demand estimates for every year through 2013 by about 3 million barrels a day, it said in its Medium Term Oil Market Report today. Consumption will average 86.76 million barrels a day in 2012, the first year it will.....Complete Story
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