The Officials

December Brent bounced off a drop below $65 in the early afternoon and spent the rest of the day just above that level, reaching the close at $65.34/bbl. Despite that relatively performance by flat price, the prompt spread went on an adventure up to a high of 49c this afternoon. In the words of a trader, we were gearing up for “another play” as spreads outclassed flat price. But there’s little sign of a concerted play in the North Sea window at the moment, as Vitol continues to prop up the buyside, but other players remain quiet. Trafi has been persistently offering a 3-7 Nov Johan Sverdrup cargo but had been getting nowhere. Today it lowered that down to Dated +$0.20, where, at last, Totsa lifted it – 50c lower than they offered the same cargo yesterday! The physical differential slipped just 1c to 91c.

In the week ending 3 October 2025, exchange traded futures volumes rose w/w across all contracts in the front three tenors, except the December and January WTI futures.

Brent found its feet in the Asian session, fluctuating in the mid-$65 range. It got choppier when Europe woke up on a grey, sunless morning but reached the close at $65.64/bbl.

Busy times. OPEC over the weekend, Saudi OSPs on Monday, and allocations later in the week. See for more in the report!

They don’t like to be predictable! The Saudis kept November OSPs for Extra Light and Light to Asia flat from October, at the average of Dubai and Oman +$2.50 and +$2.20, respectively. Medium and Heavy were each cut by 30c.

OPEC needs to be careful this weekend, as its positioning at the meeting could easily spook a market already nervous about being long and a coming price war. Be prepared in case of a misjudgement and the loud sound of a toilet flushing on Monday morning as flat price plunges. Who could add 500 kb/d anyway? We’re scratching our heads trying to figure it out; most members are flat out already! Only KSA has any real spare capacity – it’s not OPEC, it’s Saudi!

Does it want $65 or not? Brent bounced back off the $64 level and briefly looked like it wanted to get above $65 again at 10:00 BST, before dropping back. Was the bearishness flushed away yesterday? Well, Brent is stronger than it was at the end of yesterday’s trading, but still looks rather deflated. Spreads and flat price are going funky – read about the impact of the El Segundo fire on the next page!

Price war? It certainly feels like the market is being put through the ringer today. Brent dropped to under $65 and struggled to get it back up, wobbling around as though dazed into the early afternoon. Pre-window, however, it dropped to the mid-$64 range – its lowest in months! And then it kept going, now flirting with the $63 handle at the time of writing. The flat and even contango spreads are gradually creeping forward, as now the Apr/May spread is slipping into a few cents of contango. While China’s away, the bears come out to play!

The bears are on the rampage! The $65-70 range looked impenetrable for a long time as an assault on the lower bound was repulsed before 10:30 BST. But a rapid-fire go again had us down to the $64 range minutes later. Nothing lasts, though, and it was quickly back above $65. But it’s really all about Dubai, whichever metric you choose; flat price, time spreads, Brent/Dubai… It’s getting soft in the PG. The MidEastern market has gone from super hot to not even lukewarm. Slam down.

The oil market seems to be bottoming out after almost kissing the 65 dollar mark. You just can’t stop some people, especially raging bears, as Mercuria returned to offer. We thought their Dubai antics would have tired them out, but no! For another session, Merc offered Midland, a 23-27 Oct cargo at Dated +$2, while BP has flipped from its buyside activity to offering Midland: for 18-22 Oct and 23-27 Oct, as well as 28-30 Oct Ekofisk.

Some very juicy stuff in the Dubai window!

The attention was firmly on Asia this month, as APPEC set the tone and markets worried about Chinese stockpiling offsetting Saudi supply boosts. But Europe and Africa were full of surprises too.

Volumes continue to be up on the week but down on a yearly basis!

The end of a big month for the oil market and The Officials! We were very curious what the feeling would be at the big APPEC gathering in Singapore. The narrative there was decidedly bearish. Ooh, the sky is falling, the consultants and the EIA and IEA are saying there is a glut! Bearish supply and demand balances, blah, blah, blah…‘The Super Glut,’ as some called it. That was on the Monday before the Israeli bombardments of Qatar on Tuesday, and also while Mercuria was making some bearish moves on the Dubai benchmark and Vitol the opposite.

The glass ceiling of $70 is unbreachable! It would take firing a real rocket, Tomahawk maybe 🤣, up Brent’s backside to get above that point, as we remain stuck in the $65-70/bbl range, now dropping to $2.91/bbl by the European close. That’s down almost 3 bucks from Friday’s Europe close – welcome to the pain cave! Nov EFPs even dropped into pricing negatively this afternoon ahead of expiry, to the surprise of an experienced trader who couldn’t recall having seen that before.