Reports

The Officials: Batten down the hatches, a storm’s coming!

Traders were hoping for a quiet day going into the weekend but instead they got a comatose or nearly dead oil
market. At 15:00 BST Nov Brent stood at a consolidated $73.40/bbl, slightly above its level at yesterday’s close.
Then, however, markets went into freefall. Within the hour, Brent had toppled down by almost $2/bbl, to around
$71.50/bbl. Disastrous Canadian PMIs? Americans selling off? Or just the dour macros weighing down
everyone’s souls? And then in come the Saudis, slashing their monthly OSPs across the board for October
against the preceding month’s differentials. All grades into the Med and Northwest Europe received 80c cuts. In Asia, Arab Light and Medium took a 70c and 80c hits respectively, while Heavy was slapped with a full $1 cut.

Onyx Alpha: Fuels on Sale

Another week brings another selection of new trade ideas from Onyx Research, this time looking at trades in fuel oil and gasoline swaps. Our weekly Onyx Alpha report presents speculative and hedging trades based on technical analysis and data-driven tradecraft methods on Onyx Commitment of Traders (COT) and Flux Financials data.

Overnight & Singapore Window: Brent Weakens to $71/bbl Levels

The November Brent futures contract has seen a weak morning, falling from $71.70/bbl at 07:00 BST to $70.78/bbl levels at 11:20 BST (time of writing). In headlines, Exxon Mobil has withdrawn from bidding on Galp Energia’s 40% stake in Namibia’s offshore Mopane oil discovery, estimated to contain at least 10 billion barrels of oil and gas worth over $10 billion. According to Reuters, over 12 oil companies, including Shell and Petrobras, had shown interest in the stake, though reasons for Exxon’s exit are unclear. Separately, oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico could face disruption unless the US National Marine Fisheries Service updates its endangered species protection regulation by December 20, following a court ruling. Without an update, the regulatory process to ensure oil and gas operations are carried out following the Endangered Species Act would become more cumbersome and complicated, potentially affecting production, as highlighted by the API. The Gulf currently produces 15% of the nation’s oil and employs over 400,000 people. At the time of writing, the Nov/Dec and Nov/May’24 Brent spreads are at $0.43/bbl and $1.16/bbl, respectively.

The Officials: Don’t seek salvation in dollar depreciation

Traders were hoping for a quiet day going into the weekend but instead they got a comatose or nearly dead oil
market. At 15:00 BST Nov Brent stood at a consolidated $73.40/bbl, slightly above its level at yesterday’s close.
Then, however, markets went into freefall. Within the hour, Brent had toppled down by almost $2/bbl, to around
$71.50/bbl. Disastrous Canadian PMIs? Americans selling off? Or just the dour macros weighing down
everyone’s souls? And then in come the Saudis, slashing their monthly OSPs across the board for October
against the preceding month’s differentials. All grades into the Med and Northwest Europe received 80c cuts. In Asia, Arab Light and Medium took a 70c and 80c hits respectively, while Heavy was slapped with a full $1 cut.

Naphtha Report: Cracking Strength

The naphtha market has witnessed remarkable strength on a crack basis into the new month, with the softness in naphtha offset by a weaker Brent futures complex in Northwestern Europe and Asian markets. For instance, while the Oct’24 NWE crack rallied from -$5.00/bbl a fortnight ago to -$3.25/bbl on 09 Sep (at the time of writing), the Oct/Nov’24 NWE naphtha spread weakened from $6.75/mt to $5/mt at the same time.

European Window: Brent Price Volatile at $71.90/bbl

Nov’24 Brent futures flat price was volatile this afternoon, pricing at $71.68/bbl at 12:00 BST, with a high of $72.07/bbl at 12:53 BST and low of $70.68/bbl at 12:54 BST, before climbing to $71.94/bbl at 17:45 BST (time of writing). In the news today, tropical storm Francine has formed over the Gulf of Mexico and is set to hit the upper Texas and Louisiana coasts as a hurricane later this week. In response, Shell has paused drilling operations at its Perdido and Whale offshore platforms, both in the storm’s path according to Reuters. Exxon has also temporarily halted operations at the Hoover oil platform, offshore Texas. Meanwhile, the port of Freeport in Texas has decided to remain open to seaborne commercial traffic, on the condition that vessels report their movements. In other news, the ongoing shutdown of Libyan oil exports is propping up several light crude oil grades, including WTI Midland. European imports of WTI Midland have increased 24% m/m in August, reaching 1.43 mb/d. The US crude could replace lost volumes of Libyan crude in the short term, whilst Azeri and Algerian Saharan Blend will be refiners’ top choices for Libyan substitutes for October, according to Rystad Energy. Finally, Indian demand for oil products is down in August by 2.6% y/y as heavy rainfall has dampened diesel demand (-2.4% y/y). At the time of writing, the front month (Nov/Dec’24) and six-month (Nov/May’25) Brent futures spreads are at $0.45/bbl and $1.22/bbl, respectively.

Futures Report: Bear ATTACK

The Nov’24 Brent futures contract capitulated over the past week as bearish sentiment mounted. Prices fell by over 5% to their lowest level this year, only finding support at the $71-72/bbl level. Traders shifted their focus towards economic concerns, with the expectations of the resumption of Libyan supply and poor Chinese demand weighing on sentiment. Not even OPEC+ delaying their production hikes could reverse the tide as it confirmed the worsening demand outlook. Although futures market positioning is at historically short levels, there could be further room for prices to fall as the $70/bbl psychological support level looms large.

Brent Forecast: 9th September 2024

Brent crude futures saw a significant sell-off last week amid a weakening economic backdrop despite OPEC’s plans to delay its production hikes. The Nov’24 contract has stabilised at the $72/bbl level as of 09:00 BST (time of writing). While we

The Officials: Summer’s over but shorts are in!

Traders were hoping for a quiet day going into the weekend but instead they got a comatose or nearly dead oil
market. At 15:00 BST Nov Brent stood at a consolidated $73.40/bbl, slightly above its level at yesterday’s close.
Then, however, markets went into freefall. Within the hour, Brent had toppled down by almost $2/bbl, to around
$71.50/bbl. Disastrous Canadian PMIs? Americans selling off? Or just the dour macros weighing down
everyone’s souls? And then in come the Saudis, slashing their monthly OSPs across the board for October
against the preceding month’s differentials. All grades into the Med and Northwest Europe received 80c cuts. In Asia, Arab Light and Medium took a 70c and 80c hits respectively, while Heavy was slapped with a full $1 cut.

CFTC Weekly: Bears Claw Their Way Back

Money managers retraced from last week’s bullish positioning to incredible bearishness in the week ending 03 Sep. We saw long-positioned managed-by-money players trim over 32.6mb from their combined positions in Brent and WTI futures (-8.27%) while their short-positioned counterparts added over 73.2mb (+49.27%) their shorts in the benchmark crude futures contracts. This change took the combined long:short ratio for the crude futures to 1.63:1.00 this week, below the 1st percentile for long:short ratios for every week since 2013.

The Officials: Can the Saudis steady the ship?

Traders were hoping for a quiet day going into the weekend but instead they got a comatose or nearly dead oil
market. At 15:00 BST Nov Brent stood at a consolidated $73.40/bbl, slightly above its level at yesterday’s close.
Then, however, markets went into freefall. Within the hour, Brent had toppled down by almost $2/bbl, to around
$71.50/bbl. Disastrous Canadian PMIs? Americans selling off? Or just the dour macros weighing down
everyone’s souls? And then in come the Saudis, slashing their monthly OSPs across the board for October
against the preceding month’s differentials. All grades into the Med and Northwest Europe received 80c cuts. In Asia, Arab Light and Medium took a 70c and 80c hits respectively, while Heavy was slapped with a full $1 cut.

European Window: Brent Plummets To $70.82/bbl

Nov’24 Brent futures flat price took a steep decline this afternoon, pricing around $72.70/bbl at 12:00 BST followed by a high of $73.50/bbl at 14:50 BST before plummeting to $70.82/bbl at 17:15 BST (time of writing). In the news today, Iran’s crude oil exports were reduced to around 3.3 mb/d last month in compliance with OPEC+ supply restrictions, compared to an output of 3.48 mb/d in July. The Iraqi oil ministry has said the country will maintain a reduced level of oil exports in coming months, according to Reuters. In other news, state-owned Saudi Aramco lowered the OSP of its Arab Light crude for buyers in Asia by 70 cents to $1.30/bbl, according to a price list by Bloomberg. Finally, Nigeria’s new upstream deal with Italian energy major Eni plans to boost its production output to 2 mb/d by the end of 2024, Nigeria’s Minister of State Petroleum Resources said. At the time of writing, the front month (Nov/Dec’24) and six-month (Nov/May’25) Brent futures spreads are at $0.33/bbl and $0.88/bbl, respectively.

Fuel Oil Report – Sing 0.5% Rocket Launch

In high sulphur fuel oil, we saw significant weakness in the HSFO complex as reduced summer power generation demand weighed on sentiment. The conclusion of bitumen season may also be a contributing factor. The Oct’24 3.5% barge crack sold off to -$13.50/bbl by 2 Sep, and there was strong sell-side interest from trade houses. Meanwhile, the 380 East/West (Sing 380 vs 3.5% barges) saw a volatile performance over the fortnight and was marked by strong selling down the curve. Nonetheless, we noted end user buying interest.

The Officials: Shooting star Dubai leaves Brent in the dust

Ennui is such a good word to describe the feeling sparked by the dated Brent market. Finally, things start to calm down and go into a reasonable direction where weakness or strength is reflected across all instruments. Equinor continues to increase the profile of Johan Sverdrup like they have bigger plans for the crude stream and sold a cargo loading Oct 1-3 to BP at Dated flat. A boring price but we like boring.