Oil End of Day Summary: Crude Weakens

Crude futures are now trading lower on the day suggesting the market considers the wider market impact of Russian diesel and gasoline exports ban to be relatively limited with the measure generally expected to be fairly short lived.

• WTI NOV 23 down -0.3% at 89.78$/bbl
• WTI-Brent down -0.28$/bbl at -3.54$/bbl
• Crude managed money net long positions rose again to the highest since March 2022 according to Commitments of Traders data released on Friday. The combined net long positions for Brent and WTI increased by another +27k to 522k with WTI at a 19 month high and Brent at a six month high.
• Crude floating storage on vessels stationary for at least 7 days rose 11% last week to 95.93mn bbls as of September 22, compared to 86.42mn bbls the week prior according to Vortexa.
• Crude oil exports from Iraq’s Kurdistan region through a pipeline to the Turkish port of Ceyhan are expected to resume as a test soon, a SOMO source told Kurdistan24.
• Russia is succeeded in avoiding G7 sanctions on most of its oil exports, as almost three quarters of all seaborne Russian crude flows in August have travelled without western insurance, allowing Russia to sell its oil above the $60/bbl price cap.
• The average daily oil-processing rates at Russian refineries has fallen to the lowest since late May. Crude processed by refineries in the week to 20 Sep fell by nearly 100kbpd from the previous week to 5.2mbpd.
• China’s Crude Oil Production was 17.47m mt in August, up 3.13% on the year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.
• Chevron Plans to add a further 65k b/d of Venezuelan oil output by 2024 year-end in its first major drilling campaign since US sanctions were lifted on some operations in the country, according to Reuters.
• US oil production is being held back by inconsistent energy policy, Chevron Chief Executive Officer Mike Wirth said as reported by Bloomberg.
• The risks in the market to prices remain more to the upside rather than the downside, Chevron CEO Mike Wirth said in an interview with CNBC.
• Oil is headed for $150/b unless the US does more to encourage exploration, according to Continental Resources CEO Dough Lawler.
• Oil-exporting terminals in Corpus Christi, Texas will be able to load more oil onto VLCCs starting from October.
• Oil markets could breach $100/bbl in the short term but Wood Mackenzie forecasts $80-85/bbl in the medium to long term according to Sushant Gupta, research director of Asia refining at Wood Mackenzie.