Oct 2019

Oil Tumbles As Trade War Hopes Fade (31 October 2019): By Tsvetana Paraskova - Oil erased earlier gains and traded lower on Thursday morning after weak Chinese industrial data and renewed pessimism about the U.S.-China trade talks added to a rise in U.S. oil inventories to weigh on prices. At 11:57 a.m. EDT on Thursday, WTI Crude was down 1.69 percent at US$54.13 and Brent Crude traded down 1.18 percent at US$59.53. On Wednesday, the price of oil came under pressure after the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported a crude oil inventory build of 5.7 million barrels for the week to October 25. Analysts had expected a much smaller build of 729,000 barrels for last week after a 1.7-million-barrel draw interrupted a string of five weekly inventory builds, which added more than 19 million barrels to U.S. commercial crude oil inventories. (Source: Oil Price)

OPEC Is Looking For Another Member (30 October 2019): By Tsvetana Paraskova - OPEC’s top producer and de facto leader Saudi Arabia has informally asked Brazil to join the organization, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said on Wednesday, adding that he would personally like his country to be a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Another large member would be rather convenient for OPEC, who has seen its influence wane in recent years thanks to growing US shale. “I personally would very much like Brazil to become a member of OPEC,” Bolsonaro said at the Future Investment Initiative 2019 in Riyadh, as carried by Reuters. (Source: Oil Price)

Shale Stocks Are Suffering From A Sentiment Problem (29 October 2019): By Tsvetana Paraskova - Third-quarter earnings in the oil and gas industry have begun to trickle in at a time when investors have the lowest confidence and interest in U.S. shale stocks in years. After years of frustration with the lack of meaningful returns from shale firms and amid persistently low oil and gas prices, investors have turned their backs on energy stocks. Banks have too, restricting lending to shale firms who have grown production so far, mostly by taking on more debt. (Source: Oil Price)

How The Internet Is Killing The Planet (28 October 2019): By Alex Kimani - Beyond the painfully obvious plight of a planet addicted to fossil fuels, climate change has another bogeyman that few--with the possible exception of Keanu Reeves--would be willing to give up. Yet, it’s responsible for a huge chunk of our global greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, by 2025, it could be responsible for a staggering 20 percent of global electricity consumption and up to 5.5 percent of all carbon emissions. And you’re doing it right now. That bogeyman is the Internet of Things (IoT) and the tsunami of data it must power. Academics are challenging the notion that we can considerably reduce carbon emissions by increasing efficiency and cutting down on waste. (Source: Oil Price)

The Biggest Oil & Gas Discoveries Of 2019 (27 October 2019): By Julianne Geiger - The world is still making huge oil discoveries. There’s just nothing conventional about them. Conventional oil and gas discoveries have fallen by the wayside since the shale boom and the subsequent oil price collapse. In fact, they’ve fallen to their lowest in 70 years. But there are still some amazing discoveries in the mysterious deep. All in all, this year has seen new discoveries of nearly 8 billion barrels of oil equivalent, compared to 10 billion barrels of oil equivalent discovered last year. (Source: Oil Price)

Floating Nuclear Power: Chernobyl On Ice Or The Future Of Energy? (25 October 2019): By Robert Rapier - Last month the Akademik Lomonosov, a first-of-its-kind floating nuclear plant built by Russian state nuclear energy corporation, Rosatom, arrived at Pevek, a port town on the remote Chukotka Peninsula in the Russian Arctic. There, the plant is expected to provide power to about 100,000 homes. The success of this project could mark a sharp change in the way nuclear power is deployed in areas where renewable energy cannot be implemented— and could herald new advances in the fight against climate change. However, despite this promise, the Lomonosov has come under fire from anti-nuclear groups. Greenpeace has dubbed it “Chernobyl on ice”, and staged publicity stunts to get the message across. (Source: Oil Price)

Africa’s Largest Oil Nation Is Facing A Major Crisis (24 October 2019): By Tsvetana Paraskova - The unstable security situation in Libya and the continued bickering between rival governments have kept international oil companies from resuming exploration activities in the civil war-torn North African oil producer. Without exploration, Libya can never hope to exploit its significant oil reserves - the largest on the entire continent. The latest sign that the deteriorating situation is dampening the investment climate in the oil and gas sector comes from two oil majors, BP and Eni, which have shelved plans to install rigs and start exploration in Libya, the Petroleum Economist reports. (Source: Oil Price)

Iran’s $280 Billion Sanction Skirting Scheme (22 October 2019): By Simon Watkins - Given that China has put its expansion into Iran on hold for the time being due to the backlash in Iran on the extent of such plans, Tehran is now looking at ways in which it can plug the initial US$280 billion that had been expected from China to develop its oil, gas, and petrochemicals sectors. As U.S. sanctions make direct investment by foreigners extremely difficult and also act as a brake on international investment flowing into the Tehran Stock Exchange, the bond market looks like the only fund-raising game in town for Tehran. The chief executive officer of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC), Masoud Karbasian, said last week that Iran is looking at a range of such offerings and, following extensive talks with various senior figures in Iran connected to the Petroleum Ministry, OilPrice.com can now confirm to know what these options are. (Source: Oil Price)

The Best Way To Invest In Modern Day Oil Exploration (20 October 2019): By Alex Kimani - Although modern oil companies operate in a very different world from that of the villainous oil baron JR Ewing, the fictional Texan character can still offer investors some inspiration or act as warning in an industry where share prices can soar or crash in a day, depending on whether an explorer strikes oil or comes up dry. Explorers love to frequently trumpet exciting prospects. The dirty truth, however, is that the typical success rate is just one in seven wells. (Source: Oil Price)

EWEC and ACWA secure Dh3.19 billion for Abu Dhabi desalination plant (19 October 2019): Emirates Water and Electricity Company (EWEC) and Saudi Arabia's Acwa Power secured Dh3.19 billion in funding for a reverse osmosis water desalination plant project in Abu Dhabi. The funding is a combination of loans totalling Dh2.71bn as well as equity contributions from shareholders and operating cash flow from pre-operations, the companies said in a statement on Saturday. The new plant will be located in Al Taweelah power and water desalination complex in the capital and is expected to be completed by 2022. "Our financial targets have been met and … this new initiative can now get under way," Othman Al Ali, chief executive of EWEC, said. (Source: The National (UAE))

Trump Claims To Have Taken Control Of Middle East Oil (18 October 2019): By Julianne Geiger - “We’ve taken control of the oil in the Middle East,” President Trump claimed on Friday afternoon, in response to criticism over his handling of US troop movements out of Syria. “We’ve taken control of the oil in the Middle East, the oil that we’re talking about, the oil that everybody was worried about. We have the U.S. control of that,” Trump said, adding that America’s actions in Syria should have been made years ago under the Obama administration. (Source: Oil Price)

Is Bill Gates Right On Energy Investing?: Join Our Community - Not long ago, Bill Gates offered some investment advice. That, in itself, constitutes news, but the content and the reactions make up a more interesting story. Gates told the Financial Times, in essence, that investors who want to do something about climate change should stop making up lists of companies they do not want in their portfolios based on involvement in fossil fuel production or use. They should, instead, invest in disruptive technologies that will provide actual solutions to climate change. (Source: Oil Price)

The Race To Save $100 Billion - A Digital Revolution In Oil (9 October 2019): In a new in-depth study, Rystad Energy estimates that as much as $100 billion can be eliminated from E&P upstream budgets through automation and digitalization initiatives in the 2020s. Service companies are reinventing themselves to help operators unlock these savings. In 2018, $1 trillion was spent on operational expenditures, wells, facilities and subsea capital expenditures across more than 3,000 companies in the upstream space. There are varying degrees of potential savings within offshore, shale and conventional onshore activity budgets, but in total, around 10% of this spend can be erased through more efficient and productive operations thanks to automation and digitalization. (Source: Oil Price)

An Energy Blackhole? The Dirty Truth About Bitcoin Mining (8 October 2019): By Alex Kimani - This year’s bitcoin bull run has coincided with record levels of mining activity--in fact, it’s seen an 800% increase since $20,000 peak to 84 quintillion hashes per second in September, re-igniting the years’-old debate: how eco-friendly is crypto mining? For some crypto buffs, critics who squawk at the vast amounts of energy supposedly consumed by crypto mining and how it contributes to climate change are little more than churlish, pedantic party poopers. (Source: Oil Price)

$10 Oil - How Far Could Oil Prices Fall If We See A 2009 Style Crash? (7 October 2019): By Julianne Geiger - While predictions about volatile oil prices abound, one theme keeps popping up: geopolitical risk premium. First it was theories about a closure at the Strait of Hormuz. Then it was fears of an all-out war between Iran and the United States or Iran and Saudi Arabia. All those are merely possibilities, but the reality suggests that a whole different kind of extreme is far more likely: crushingly low oil prices. In amongst the screams of geopolitical risk premium are far scarier whispers of words such as demand destruction, trade disputes, and economic climate deterioration. And those words describe the current reality in the market, and as such, suggest a similar future reality—a reality where demand destruction continues to push prices down, down, down. Is $10 oil really possible? (Source: Oil Price)

Capital Flight Is Killing The US Shale Boom (6 October 2019): By Nick Cunningham - The growth in U.S. shale production is grinding to a halt as low prices put drillers in a financial vice. The slowdown has been unfolding for much of 2019, but the latest slide in oil prices is another blow to cash-strapped companies. Share prices for many E&Ps are down sharply. For instance, Devon Energy’s stock is down 20 percent since mid-September; EOG Resources is off by 17 percent and Pioneer Natural Resources is down by more than 13 percent. Many other companies have seen similar declines. (Source: Oil Price)

The Oil Majors Leading The M&A Boom In Oil And Gas (5 October 2019): European supermajors BP and Shell occupy the top spots on opposite sides of Rystad Energy’s M&A ranking for the oil and gas sector during the last five-year period. Rystad Energy has analyzed the share of resources traded globally from 2015 through July 2019. Two oil and gas companies stand out in the tally, not including the outlier deal between Occidental and Anadarko in May this year: BP has seen the most resource growth from mergers and acquisitions (M&A) across all supply segments, adding nearly 6.5 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe). (Source: Oil Price)

Oil Markets: Everything Is About Weak Demand (4 October 2019): By Tom Kool - Oil prices recovered somewhat early on Friday morning, but handed in gains by noon as traders continue to worry about the state of the global economy. Oil prices dropped sharply during trading on Thursday but recovered on hopes of more aggressive action from the Federal Reserve. The U.S. jobs report on Friday revealed more weakness, but it wasn’t as poor as feared. Geopolitical risk has receded from the top of minds of oil traders. Everything is about weak demand now. (Source: Oil Price)

Abu Dhabi’s ADNOC Seeks $5B In Gas Pipelines Stake Sale (3 October 2019): By Tsvetana Paraskova - The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) has started a process to sell a minority stake in its natural gas pipeline infrastructure, with a potential deal expected to raise as much as US$5 billion, people in the know told Bloomberg on Thursday. The process of the sale, which could be structured as a long-term lease rather than a direct stake sale, is expected to attract private equity firms and infrastructure funds, according to Bloomberg’s sources. A deal could put a value of US$15 billion to the entire gas pipeline infrastructure of ADNOC, including debt, the sources said. (Source: Oil Price)

Large Surprise Crude Draw Lifts Oil Prices (1 October 2019): By Julianne Geiger - The American Petroleum Institute (API) has estimated a large crude oil inventory draw of 5.92 million barrels for the week ending September 26 - a surprise compared to analyst expectations of a 1.567-million-barrel build. Last week saw a surprise build in crude oil inventories of 1.38 million barrels, according to API data. The EIA estimated that week that there was larger inventory build of 2.4 million barrels. After today’s inventory move, the net draw for the year is 29.85 million barrels for the 40-week reporting period so far, using API data. (Source: Oil Price)

Is This The End Of The Lithium-Ion Battery? (1 October 2019): By Tsvetana Paraskova - Researchers have been in a race to find ways to improve lithium-ion batteries. They are also looking to develop alternatives to the lithium-ion battery that would be lower cost and more sustainable to manufacture. And they may just have found one. Aluminum-based batteries would be cheaper to make, because aluminum is the third most abundant element in the Earth’s crust after oxygen and silicon. Aluminum is also light-weight and could be ideal for use in batteries. (Source: Oil Price)