Crude Oil
Oil prices were mixed on Friday.
While Brent crude fell 15 cents to settle at $43.15 a barrel, while WTI crude rose 14 cents to settle at $41.11 per barrel.
Both the U.S. and Brent crude benchmarks posted weekly gains after Saudi Arabia pressed allies to stick to production quotas. Brent rose 8.3% for the week while WTI gained 10.1%.
Market sentiment fell on Friday after eastern Libyan commander Khalifa Haftar announced he would lift his blockade of oil output for one month. The blockade slashed Libyan production to just over 100,000 barrels per day now from around 1.2 million bpd previously. It was unclear how quickly Libya could ramp up production.
Storm Beta formed in the Bay of Campeche and was forecast to gradually strengthen and soak the Texas coast all week, the National Hurricane Center said. There were 24 platforms awaiting the return of work crews on Saturday, down from 149 earlier in the week.
China’s imports of fuel blending components are set to slow over the rest of 2020 having more than doubled YoY in the first seven months as rising fuel stockpiles snuff out importer profits, industry sources said.
US energy firms cut 1 oil rig in the week to 18 Sep’20 to total 179 (-540 YoY) according to Baker Hughes. Cowen & Co said the 45 independent E&P companies it tracks plan to slash spending by about 47% in 2020 versus 2019.
Money managers raised their net long U.S. crude futures and options positions in the week to Sept. 15 by 30,970 contracts to 308,522, the CFTC said on Friday.
covid 19
At a global level, the death toll from the COVID-19 virus rose to 964,762 (+3,891 DoD) yesterday. The total number of active cases rose by around 38,000 to 7,441,347. (Click here for details).
Naphtha
Asia’s naphtha crack eased 2 cents to $89.83 a tonne after hitting a 10-week high in the previous session.
The October crack is lower at $ 2.25 / bbl.
Gasoline
Asia’s gasoline refining margins rose on Friday to a 6-month high of $5.06 a barrel.
Gasoline inventories held at ARA fell 5.3% to a two-month low of 1.3 million tonnes in the week to Thursday. The European gasoline shipments were seen going to the U.S. East Coast, the Caribbean, Mexico, Africa and Puerto Rico.
The October crack is lower at $ 4.30 / bbl
Click Here for a graphical depiction of Global Gasoline stocks by region.
Distillates
Asian refining margins for 10 ppm gasoil posted a weekly decline on Friday, weighed down by plentiful regional supplies and lack of arbitrage opportunities.
Cash discounts for 10 ppm gasoil were at 70 cents a barrel to Singapore quotes, compared with a discount of 68 cents per barrel a day earlier.
Jet fuel stocks held independently in ARA refining and storage hub dropped 4.2% to 954 KT in the week ended Sept. 17. ARA gasoil inventories rose 1.6% to 2.9 million tonnes. Compared with a year earlier, ARA gasoil inventories were up 7.4%, while jet fuel stocks were 42.2% higher.
The October crack for 500 ppm Gasoil is unchanged at $2.50 /bbl with the 10 ppm crack at $ 3.00 / bbl. The regrade is at -$ 3.10 /bbl.
Click Here for a graphical depiction of Global Distillate stocks by region.
Fuel Oil
Asia’s 0.5% VLSFO time spread firmed to a near two-month high of minus 25 cents a tonne, while the cash differential for cargoes of the fuel climbed to a more than one-month high despite an absence of physical trade activity.
Residual fuel inventories at ARA fell 5% from the previous week to a two-week low of 1.171 million tonnes in the week ended Sept. 17. Compared with last year, the inventories at the ARA hub were 12% lower and were below the five-year seasonal average of 1.066 million tonnes.
The October crack for 180 cst FO is higher at – $2.65 /bbl with the visco spread at $0.80 /bbl.
Click Here for a graphical depiction of Fuel Oil stocks by region.
Hedge Recommendations
No fresh action today
Hedge recommendations are essentially made for refiners. These are not trading positions as such. The rationale of these positions is to lock in extraordinary levels for the refinery.
Click Here to see how all our recommendations have fared
About this blog
This blog post attempts to give a top level summary of the Singapore market goings on to a person who seeks to obtain a directional sense of the market on a daily basis.