Friday 29 April 2016

Today's ENERGY News - 29 April 2016




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Oil Prices Fall On Unexpected EIA Barrel Build




One hundred and sixteen years after the birth of Woody Woodpecker creator and animator Walter Lantz, and WTI crude oil is knocking on the door of $45 – and knocking on wood that U.S. production is wilting. Here are six things to consider about the oil market on this final Wednesday in April: 1) Today is set to be dominated by a game of two halves; inventories this morning, and Federal Reserve rumblings this afternoon. While the API inventory report points to a draw to crude stocks (h/t lower imports), expectations of dovish rhetoric from the Fed is putting downward pressure on the dollar. Hence, crude is once again pushing on to new highs for the year. The bullish sentiment for oil however did not last long after the DOE surprised by contradicting the API and reporting a significant build in U.S. crude stocks. 2) A piece today talking […]

Analysts Aren’t Buying the Oil Rally

Even as oil rallies, analysts have barely nudged up their price forecasts as they worry that crude’s current gains might not be sustainable. The price of oil has jumped by around 70% from the decade-lows it hit earlier this year. That is mainly on hopes that dwindling U.S. oil production will help take crude out of an oversupplied market. But many analysts aren’t buying the rally. They question whether the glut is indeed on the wane given current stockpiles and the potential for increased supply from Iran and elsewhere. They point out that last year, the oil price also rallied in the spring on a belief that supply was falling, only to collapse in the second half of the year. A survey of 13 investment banks by The Wall Street Journal sees Brent crude, the international oil-price benchmark, averaging $41 a barrel this year, up a dollar from the […]


Something Has To Give – Goldman Sachs Expects More Dividend Cuts

It hasn’t been a great week for Big Oil. BP reported an 80 percent decline in earnings, and ExxonMobil lost its coveted AAA credit rating , which it has held uninterrupted for more than eight decades. Low oil prices are still wreaking havoc on the industry, hollowing out profits and forcing companies to cut back on spending and personnel. It is a sign of the times that BP’s $532 million net profit – which excludes nearly $1 billion in fresh charges from the Deepwater Horizon disaster way back in 2010 – beat analysts’ estimates and was considered a very positive result. BP’s share price jumped more than 5 percent on April 26 following the results. But the oil majors are still hurting. And it is unclear whether or not they can maintain their generous dividend policies. BP’s dividend yield now exceeds 7 percent and Royal Dutch Shell has a […]


Why Saudi Arabia Will Not Win The Oil Price War

Crude oil prices continued to surprise on Tuesday, with the U.S. benchmark adding another 4 percent to $44.60 a barrel. West Texas Intermediate is now up 65 percent since hitting 13-year lows below $27 a barrel February 11. It’s a performance only bettered by the globe’s second most traded bulk commodity – iron ore. But like analysts of the steelmaking raw material, many in the industry have been surprised by the extent of the rally, consistently calling the oil price lower. The blame for the cloudy outlook for crude is mostly being laid at the door of Saudi-Arabia. After the collapse of the Doha talks to freeze production and amid a spat with the U.S. over terrorism , the world’s top producer has threatened a scorched earth policy when it comes to maintaining and growing its market share. But there is an alternative view out there that argues that […]


Venezuela Needs Oil’s Rally More Than Anyone as Economy Teeters


Few countries need oil’s rally to last more than Venezuela, where the economy’s expected to shrink 8 percent this year and a lack of petrodollars has seen shops run short of consumer goods. The Latin American nation with the world’s largest oil reserves relies on crude shipments for 95 percent of export revenue. It will default this year barring a large jump in the oil price or a financial bailout, said Thomas Olney, a London-based analyst at consultants FGE. Credit-default swap traders have put the chances of non-payment through June next year at 67 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Following the collapse of oil-freeze talks in Qatar this month, Venezuelan Energy Minister Eulogio del Pino warned crude may revisit the 12-year lows of earlier this year as supply continues to swamp demand. Even with a rebound since February, prices remain 60 percent below their 2014 high. That’s […]



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The Nuclear Taboo - Rethinking Armageddon





Rethinking Armageddon



The First Nuclear Age was characterized by the Cold War era bipolar international system and a corresponding bipolar nuclear competition between the United States and the Soviet Union. While a few other states, such as Great Britain and France, also possessed nuclear arms, their arsenals were very small compared to those of the two superpowers.
The world is far different today. On the one hand, both the United States and Russia have far smaller nuclear arsenals than they did at the Cold War’s end. At the same time, new nuclear powers have emerged in pace with advanced conventional precision warfare capabilities. The rise of cyber warfare has also led to concerns over the security and reliability of early warning and command-and-control systems, and weapon systems as well. Advances in the cognitive sciences and research on Cold War crisis decision-making have challenged some of our thinking as to how strategies based on deterrence work, or risk failing. Together, these and other recent developments have combined to form what some are calling a Second Nuclear Age.

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Thursday 28 April 2016

Today's ENERGY News - 28 April 2016




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BP eyes more spending cuts after 80 percent profit drop



BP said on Tuesday it could cut capital spending further after reporting an 80 percent drop in profits in the first quarter of the year, when oil prices touched a near 13-year low. The British oil company, the first major to report on one of the weakest quarters, lowered its 2016 spending target to $17 billion, from $17-19 billion, and said the marker could fall to $15-$17 billion next year if oil prices remain weak. These cost reductions have enabled the oil producer to forecast it can balance its books at an oil price of $50-55 a barrel in 2017, it said, down from $60 previously eyed. BP shares opened 3 percent higher on the London Stock Exchange on Tuesday, the second-biggest gainer in the blue-chip FTSE 100 index. Chief Executive Bob Dudley said he […]

Texas, Oklahoma, Wyoming: Oil Woes Start to Hit Hard

There are some early signs of delinquency-rate… The slump in crude prices is starting to show up as missed payments by consumers in the oil patch. In states from Oklahoma and Texas to North Dakota and Wyoming, rising unemployment in the energy sector is pushing up loan delinquencies and raising the risk of new losses for banks. Overall, energy-dependent states are posting delinquency rates that in many cases exceed the national average, according to data prepared for The Wall Street Journal by credit bureau TransUnion. “In these energy states, we are clearly seeing the impact of the loss of oil jobs,” said Ezra Becker, senior vice president and head of research at TransUnion. “We don’t expect to see any kind of material improvement in the short term.” Some 119,600 oil and gas jobs nationwide have been eliminated—22% of the total—since September […]

Oil Rising Faster Than Ruble Bolsters Russia’s Revenue Outlook

The outlook for Russia’s earnings from oil exports is improving as the price of a barrel of crude in ruble terms rose to the highest in more than five months. The currency’s 2.8 percent advance this month has lagged a gain of 18 percent in Brent crude, which is used to price Russia’s main export blend. The exchange rate’s relative weakness means the government is earning more from sales of the dollar-denominated commodity. The ruble was little changed at 65.18 per dollar by 12:33 p.m. in Moscow as Brent rose 2.4 percent to $46.84 a barrel, or 3,052 rubles. The oil-price recovery is bringing relief to the government as it seeks funds to bridge what analysts project will be the biggest budget deficit as a percentage of economic output since 2010. This year’s fiscal plan was based on the state receiving 3,165 rubles for each barrel it sells. The […]

Can Oil Continue To Rally Like This?

The collapse of the rig count and depressed drilling activity has already knocked about 700,000 barrels per day of oil production offline. • But the rig count could bottom out this year and begin climbing again. However, the EIA doesn’t expect oil production to rise in the short run even if the rig count rebounds. Oil production is expected to continue to fall through 2017 as too few new wells come online to replace rapidly falling shale output. • Total U.S. oil production is expected to fall from 9.43 mb/d in 2015 to 8.04 mb/d in 2017, a figure that includes rising output from […]

Unpaid bills add to China debt problems as receivables mount



Times have changed for Yu Xingzhi since China’s economic boom years. Despite the slowing economy, sales at Shanghai Caison Color Material Chemical are holding up. The trouble is, her customers — garment manufacturers and packaging producers buying her dyes and inks — are taking more time to pay for what they buy. “Receivables are the unavoidable problem for traditional manufacturers. If you don’t accept receivables, you have no business. It’s standard industry practice, even though no one likes it,” says Ms Yu, the dyemaker’s general manager. It is a vicious circle and one threatening the health of the economy. Ever longer delays in bills being paid are creating a chain of squeezed cash flow and debt that runs from large state-owned enterprises through to smaller suppliers and even employees struggling to pay their own bills. Listed companies had to wait a median 70 days to receive payment last year, […]

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Climate Change Dramatically Affects Africa

 Climate News

 


Africa 2050 Human Existence Still Possible?


Climate: Africa’s Human Existence Is at Severe Risk 


“Africa’s human existence and development is under threat from the adverse impacts of climate change – its population, ecosystems and unique biodiversity will all be the major victims of global climate change.”

This is how clear the Nairobi-based United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is when it comes to assessing the negative impact of climate change on this continent of 54 countries with a combined population of over 1,200 billion [1.2 billion] inhabitants. “No continent will be struck as severely by the impacts of climate change as Africa.”

Other international organisations are similarly trenchant. For instance, the World Bank, basing on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports, confirms that Africa is becoming the most exposed region in the world to the impacts of climate change.

In Sub-Saharan Africa, extreme weather will cause dry areas to become drier and wet areas wetter; agriculture yields will suffer from crop failures; and diseases will spread to new altitudes, say the World Bank experts, while alerting that by 2030 it is expected that 90 million more people in Africa will be exposed to malaria, “already the biggest killer in Sub-Saharan Africa.”




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Wednesday 27 April 2016

Today's ENERGY News - 27 April 2016




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Weakened Saudi Arabia Could See Social Unrest After Economic Shakeup



Despite oil’s rebound from cyclical lows and the world’s exuberance that the energy space may be saved (on the basis of headline-reading algo pumping momentum into commodity futures products that only leveraged Chinese speculators could find value in), something ugly is occurring in Saudi Arabian money-markets. There appears to be a growing funding squeeze in The Kingdom as 3-month interbank rates spike above 2 percent for the first time since January 2009, prompting King Salman to approve a ‘post-oil economic plan’. (Click to enlarge) Whether this spike is responsible or not, The Kingdom is clearly seeking ways to reduce its reliance on crude. As Bloomberg reports, King Salman approved a blueprint for diversifying the country’s economy away from oil on Monday, a package of developmental, economic, social and other programs. Saudi Arabia’s plan for the post-hydrocarbon era will have to overcome habits developed over decades of relying on crude […]

Venezuela Starts Power Rationing, Oil Production Likely to Fall

Venezuela—home to the largest oil reserves in the world–will for the next 40 days experience a four-hour blackout every single day, and there are fears that the rationing could lead to unrest and trigger a decline in oil output at a time when the country is barely hanging on. The decision to ration electricity was brought about by a severe drought that has rendered the level of the Guri dam – the country’s major source of power generation – so low that if the weather doesn’t change, the authorities will have to shut it down. The blackouts will affect households and industrial users alike–and it’s very likely that oil production will drop. This drop, however, will not be too significant, especially in the current state of oversupply. The Financial Times last week quoted analysts as estimating that irregular power outages could lead to a daily decline in oil output […]



China Stockpiling Oil At Highest Rate In Over A Decade

China might be in the midst of another round of stockpiling, stepping up crude oil imports to fill its strategic petroleum reserve (SPR). The slowdown in oil demand in China is one of the chief concerns regarding the state of oversupply in global oil markets. Excess production has driven down prices, but soft demand in China over the past year or so has led to a protracted recovery. After a period of softness, oil imports could be rising once again. Bloomberg reports that the number of oil supertankers docking at Chinese ports is at a 16-month high. And there are 83 supertankers currently on their way to China, with a capacity of 166 million barrels of crude, the highest number in four months. In the first quarter of this year China diverted about 787,000 barrels per day into its strategic stockpile, the highest rate since Bloomberg has been tracking […]



Indonesia OPEC Governor: No Urgency To Freeze Output With Oil At $45

Indonesia’s governor to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries said on Monday that oil at $45 a barrel was “not bad” and that there would be no urgency to freeze output if crude remained at that price. Despite failure to reach a deal to curb oil output and support prices at an April 17 meeting of OPEC and non-OPEC producers, crude prices have maintained a general upward trend since hitting a 12-year trough in mid-January. Front-month Brent crude was trading at $44.75 per barrel at 0752 GMT, down 36 cents, or 0.8 percent, from its last settlement as traders took profits after three weeks of gains. “The price is $45, which is not […]



China Bans Some New Coal Power Plants



China’s government is banning construction of new coal-fired power plants in areas with surplus power supply, a move that could weigh on already-struggling coal markets . The new measures outlined Monday by China’s top economic planner, the National Development and Reform Commission, underscore the central government’s deep concern with overcapacity across China’s economy, a result of weakening industrial demand as growth slows. Beijing has previously said it aimed to curb thermal power overcapacity ; analysts said the fact that it now came from an official NDRC communiqué was the clearest signal yet that it won’t tolerate new coal capacity in regions that already have excess supply. Weaker demand for coal inside China could ultimately lead to higher exports, which would exacerbate the huge supplies of coal sloshing around global markets. The higher supplies could drive down global benchmark prices and hit the bottom lines of major U.S. and international […]


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