Internal wrangles see OPEC quota left at 30mbpd

Some wanted a production quota cut; others didn’t and in the end it all bottled down to what the Saudis wanted – a rollover of the level set at 30 million barrels per day (bpd) since December 2011. So as the 166th meeting of OPEC ministers ended, Al-Naimi departed Helferstorferstrasse 17 - OPEC's HQ in Vienna, Austria having got his wish.

Had a cut been enforced and the Saudis not respected the agreement, it would have been meaningless. So the announcement did not come as much of surprise to many analysts, yours truly including.

For a spot report, you are welcome to read the Oilholic’s take on Forbes and the ‘longstanding’ Secretary General Abdalla Salem El-Badri’s jovial press conference explaining why the cartel acted as it did in the interests of “market equilibrium and global wellbeing”.

Rather calmly, OPEC has also suggested it would hold its next meeting in June as normal and extended El-Badri’s term until December 2015. But the Oilholic suspects a US$60 per barrel floor would be tested sooner than most expect. Will an extraordinary meeting be called then? Will OPEC let things be until it meets again June? What about Venezuela, Iran and Nigeria who will leave Vienna thoroughly dissatisfied?

It is indeed credible to assume that OPEC will grin and bear the oil price decline in the interest of holding on to its 30% share of the global crude markets for the moment. But for how long as not all are in agreement of the decision taken today?

Barely minutes after El-Badri stopped speaking, Brent shed a dollar. Within the hour it was trading below $73 a barrel while the WTI slid below $70. We’re now formally in the territory where it becomes a game of nerves. For the moment, none of the major oil producing nations, both within and outside OPEC, are willing to cut production even when demand for oil isn’t that great.

Should bearish trends continue, will someone blink first? Will finances dictate a production decline for someone? Will some or more of the producers come together and take coordinated action with OPEC?
These are the million barrel questions!

The latter option was attempted in Vienna bringing the Russians and Mexicans to the table, but the Saudis ensured it didn't succeed. The next four months ought to be interesting. On that note, it's good night from OPEC HQ. Analysis and a post mortem to follow over the coming days, but that’s all for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’! 

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© Gaurav Sharma 2014. Photo: Abdalla Salem El-Badri speaks at the 166th OPEC Ministers’ meeting in Vienna, Austria © Gaurav Sharma, November 27, 2014

Bears in the crude jungle don’t scare Al-Naimi

Having had enough of briefing scribes and analysts over the past few days and giving little away, Saudi Oil Minister Ali Al-Naimi told all surplus inquirers to bugger off at this morning’s pre-conference OPEC media scrum.

He has stubbornly stuck to the quip that the market has been where it is at the moment before and it will stabilise like it has always done in the past.

The only problem is the current supply scenario is unlike anything we’ve witnessed over the last two decades in the Oilholic’s humble opinion, with plenty of the crude stuff around much lower than anticipated demand.

Contrary to what some might feel here at OPEC HQ, Al-Naimi is not ignoring this profound change but rather tackling it head on for his country first and foremost. It’s an instinct called self-preservation.

Separate discounts on asking price offered to Asian and US buyers by Saudi Aramco, along with anecdotes about the Saudis sending direct feelers on longer term deals with buyers in the Far East are stacking up. If the US is not buying much, China, India, Japan and South Korea are still in the market for and when (not if) there is an uptick demand.

The Saudis do not want to see a return to the 1980s. If that’s the case, what’s afoot at OPEC with Al-Naimi not attaching importance to a cut in output, is collateral damage. Upsetting a few who don’t like you anyway, thereby making a dysfunctional organisation more dysfunctional should matter little in a high stakes game.

Furthermore, Al-Naimi’s soundbites leading up to and at the OPEC meeting seem to suggest he feels the price correction is likely to continue well into 2015. Barely days before the OPEC meeting, Moody’s said on Monday that the steep drop in prices since the middle of this year has led it to lower its pricing assumptions for Brent and WTI by $10 in 2015 and $5 in 2016.

Its revised average spot prices assumption for Brent stand at $80 per barrel for 2015 and to $85 per barrel in 2016, and for WTI at $75 per barrel in 2015 and $80 per barrel in 2016 and thereafter. Steve Wood, managing director at Moody’s says, "Global demand has not kept pace with strong oil production worldwide, leading to the recent drop in oil prices and to our revised price assumptions. We expect that rising demand for crude will put a floor beneath crude prices in 2015 and beyond, limiting further price drops and pointing to a gradual correction.”

As a footnote, Moody's also changed its outlook for the global independent exploration and production sector to negative from positive, for the global oilfield services and drilling sector to negative from stable, and for the global integrated oil and gas sector to stable from positive.

Most non-governmental Middle Eastern commentators known to the Oilholic see the price dropping to as low as $60 per barrel. Agreed, the price might get temporary support from a potential OPEC production cut along with colder chimes that a Northern Hemisphere winter brings with it. Yet, a further drop in price is all but inevitable before supply correction and improving economics provide a floor later on in 2015.

In the meantime some at OPEC will continue to struggle, especially Venezuela, a country that needs a fiscal breakeven of over US$160 per barrel, as will Iran which would need $130 upwards. Fitch Ratings’ Paul Gamble says Ecuador is another OPEC member to keep an eye on if the oil price slide continues. This is in marked contrast to IMF estimates about Saudi Arabia needing an average oil price of $90.70, UAE $73.30, Kuwait $53.30 and Qatar $77.60.

Some at OPEC have a very different problem - that of finding new buyers and diverting the crude stuff originally extracted with the US in mind. That includes Angola and Nigeria.

At a media scrum earlier in the day, Angolan oil minister Jose Maria Botelho de Vasconcelos told the Oilholic that ensuring diversity of the country’s client base was crucial.

Having been on record as being “unhappy” about the current oil price, de Vasconcelos said, “The market suffers ups and downs. As an exporting nation we are looking to diversify our pool of importing partners. This includes the obvious push to Asia and Europe.”

Choosing not to comment about entering into a bidding war with fellow OPEC member and neighbour Nigeria, de Vasconcelos said there was room for everyone and new partners to ensure stability of supply.

Meanwhile, from the standpoint of forex markets, Kit Juckes, Global Head of Forex at Société Générale, says if OPEC fails to deliver any oil price bolstering production cuts this afternoon in Vienna, oil will probably fall further in the months ahead. “That will further anchor bond yields, probably undermine the dollar after a very strong run and support higher-yielding currencies.”

“We'd get a bigger reaction to a successful output reduction, of course than to the lack of change that is now widely expected. If oil prices do continue their fall the winners are more likely to be the emerging markets currencies rather than the G10 ones.” Its 14:30GMT and there’s no agreement yet. That’s all for the moment from Vienna folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2014. Photo 1: Saudi Arabia's Oil Minister Ali Al-Naimi. Photo 2: Angola's Oil Minister Jose Maria Botelho de Vasconcelos speaking at 166th OPEC Ministers Meeting in Vienna, Austria on November 27th, 2014 © Gaurav Sharma

OPEC grapples with a buyers’ market

It’s been a long six months between OPEC meetings with the oil price slipping almost 35% since June and the organisation's own average monthly basket price of 12 crude oils dropping 29%. 

Returning to Vienna for the 166th OPEC Meeting of ministers, the Oilholic finds his hosts in a confused state. It’s not only a case of “will or won’t” OPEC cut production, but also one of “should or shouldn’t” it cut.

As yours truly wrote in his regular quip for Forbes – the buyers’ market that we are seeing is all about market share. That matters way more than anything else at the moment. Of course, not all of OPEC’s 12 member nations are thinking that way at a time of reduced clout in wake of rising non-OPEC production and the US importing less courtesy of its shale bonanza. For some, namely Iran, Venezuela and Nigeria – the recent dip is wreaking havoc in terms of fiscal breakevens.

For them, something needs to be done here and now to prop up the price with a lot of hush-hush around the place about why a cut of 1 million barrels per day (bpd) would be just the ticket. Yet there are others, including Kuwait, UAE and Saudi Arabia who realise the importance of maintaining market share as they can afford to.

Just listen to the soundbites provided by Saudi oil minister Ali Al-Naimi. The current problem of “oversupply is not unique” as the market has the capacity to stabilise “eventually”, he’s said again and again in Vienna, ahead of the meeting over umpteen briefings since Monday. And if the Saudis don’t want a cut, it’s not going to happen.

Secondly, as this blogger has said time and again from OPEC – in the absence of publication of individual quotas, even if a cut materialises how will we know it’ll not be flouted as has often been the case in the past? In fact, it’ll be pretty obvious within a month who is or isn’t sticking to it and then the whole thing unravels. Perhaps enforcing stricter adherence would be a good starting point!

Finally, only for the second time in all of one’s years of coming to OPEC have there been so many external briefings by all parties concerned and that number of journalists attending the ministers' summit.

To put things into perspective, while the Oilholic has been here for every OPEC meeting since 2007, more than twice the usual number of analysts and journalists have turned up today indicative of the level of interest. I think the extraordinary meeting in 2008 was the last time such a number popped into town.

All were duly provided with plenty of fodder to begin with as Saudi Arabia met with Russia, Venezuela, and Mexico to “discuss the oil market” and establish a “mechanism for cooperation” to cite Venezuelan oil minister Rafael Ramirez.

While everyone talked the talk, no one walked the walk with the mini meeting ending in zero agreement. It’d be fair to say the Saudis have kept everyone guessing since but Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak expressed scepticism whether OPEC would cut production from its stated 30 million bpd level. 

On the sidelines are plenty of interesting headlines and thoughts away from the usual “oil price falls to” this or that level “since 2010”. Some interesting ones include – French investigation of Total’s dealings in Iran is still on says the FT, Reuters carries an exclusive on the chaos over who’ll represent Libya at OPEC, why Transportation ETFs are loving cheap oil explains ETF Trends, Bloomberg BusinessWeek says Iran is still pitching the 1 million bpd cut idea around and after ages (ok a good few years) the BBC is interested in OPEC again.

Additionally, IHS says US production remains healthy while Alberta's Premier says falling oil prices won't cause oil sands shutdowns. That’s all from Vienna for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2014. Photo: OPEC signage at headquarters in Vienna, Austria © Gaurav Sharma

Keystone XL farce, Jon Stewart & an OFS merger

Despite much being afoot in the crude oil world, there’s only one place to start and that’s the ongoing farce over the Keystone XL pipeline extension project. A continuation of US President Barack Obama’s dithering over approval of the transnational pipeline extension (from Alberta, Canada to Texas) is not a major surprise. However, an unassailable truth flagged up by none other than comedian and political satirist Jon Stewart certainly is! 

It seems many controversial decisions, including Keystone XL’s approval, were delayed by the Obama administration until after the US mid-term elections undoubtedly to calm worried Democrats (who were in for, and eventually did get, an electoral pasting) so that they didn’t have to take a political stand on these issues one way or another. So when Obama delayed approval of Keystone XL (again!) in April this year, that helped the President’s mates both for and against the project. 

Especially, senators Mary Landreiu (D-Louisiana), Mark Begich (D-Alaska), Mark Pryor (D-Arkansas) and Kay Hagan (D-North Carolina) all in red states favouring the project, who then used the delay as a pretext to criticise and "distance themselves" from the president. 

Conversely, blue states Democrats thought they got points for criticising the pipeline extension project to pander to opposing sentiments of their respective electorates. It was supposed to be a win-win situation; except for one thing - they all LOST and Landreiu, who is facing a tough run-off is going to, chuckled Stewart on The Daily Show broadcast for November 6 evening.

This week, the "old" senate rejected approval of Keystone XL, one of its last acts before the new Republican controlled senate convenes. At which point, the "new" senate will approve it and then one assumes the President would veto it. Then Democrat presidential candidate(s), including one Hillary Clinton who is said to be in favour of the pipeline, will take their respective positions either denouncing or praising the decision and so it goes. 

According to the splendid Stewart, it’s a popular tactic known as the “Chickensh*t gambit”. (To view the clip in the US click here, for the UK, click here, for elsewhere not quite sure where!)

Both those for and against the project should despair over the state of affairs. However, on the bright side they’ll be plenty of material for Stewart to bring a bit of laughter into our lives. As for the Canadian side, they are a patient bunch and among their ranks are some who quietly (and somewhat correctly) believe their country's need for the pipeline is diminishing as China's footprint on the global crude oil market grows ever bigger than that of the US. 

Meanwhile, by sheer coincidence barely days after the Oilholic went on Tip TV to discuss the challenging climate for oilfield services (OFS) companies (including why the Kentz takeover in August by SNC-Lavalin would not have happened now at the price it did back then), came the mother of all moves – Halliburton’s for Baker Hughes.

In case you’ve been on another planet and haven’t heard, Halliburton has agreed to buy rival Baker Hughes in a cash and shares deal worth US$34.6 billion. The transaction has been approved by both companies' boards of directors and is expected to close in late 2015, pending regulatory approval. As the oil price has fallen by a third since the summer, demand for OFS has cooled and a coming together of the second and third placed services providers makes sense in a cyclical industry.

Nonetheless, the announcement and speed of agreement took many by surprise. Dave Lesar, CEO of Halliburton, told CNBC's Squawk on the Street program on Tuesday that Baker Hughes brings complimentary product lines to the merger which his company does not have.

“Production chemicals is one, artificial lift is another, so from that standpoint they [Baker Hughes] do have some technology that we do not have. Plus they have some fantastic people in their talented organisation. Combine that with out talent and I think we’re putting together the industry bellwether.”

“Both companies are growing. We’re going to hire 21,000 people just at Halliburton this year, not only blue collar but white collar and professionals. You add that to capability and the growth we’re seeing out at Baker…I think it expands career opportunities.”

Lesar also said he had a top notch team in place to address anti-trust concerns which might involve divestments of up to $7.5 billion. The Halliburton CEO added that the response from big ticket clients, including several National Oil Companies (NOCs), had been great. “Feedback from almost of our customers, including NOCs has been pretty positive, where a stronger, more developed organisation can help them in ways neither Baker nor Halliburton could have done standing on our own.”

“Furthermore, we would not have done this deal if I did not believe that we could get this through the regulatory bodies,” Lesar said. There you have it, and it’d cost $3.5 billion in payments to Baker if he is wrong and regulators block the deal.

The Halliburton CEO largely sidestepped commenting on the Keystone XL farce and the oil price tumble, except adding on the latter point that: “We’re not in the bunker yet!” As OPEC meets on November 27, the market is in a sort of “pause still” mode. Brent is lurking just below $80 level, while the WTI is around the $75 level (see right, click to enlarge).

The Oilholic’s gut instinct, as one told Tip TV, is that OPEC has left it too late to act and should have made a call one way or another via an extraordinary meeting when the Brent fell below $85. So if they cut now, will it have the desired impact?

Meanwhile, Producers for American Crude Oil Exports (PACE), says repealing the ban on US crude oil exports will not only create hundreds of thousands of jobs and grow the economy, it will benefit consumers by “lowering gasoline prices” contrary to opinion expressed in certain quarters. That conclusion, it says, is supported by no less than seven independent economic studies. These include the Brookings Institution, IHS Energy, Dallas Federal Reserve Bank, and the US Government Accountability Office, among others. 

Finally, Fitch Ratings says the 25% drop in the oil price since July is likely to lift economic growth prospects, improve terms of trade, and have a potentially positive credit impact for a number of Asian economies if the lower prices are sustained below $90 level through 2015.

Most major Asian economies - including China, Japan, Korea and Thailand - would see an effective overall income boost from sustained lower oil prices, the agency said. In addition, countries with large oil import needs facing external adjustment pressures such as Indonesia and India are among the best positioned to see a positive impact on sovereign credit profiles, although the broader policy response will matter too, it added. That’s all for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma, October, 2014. Photo 1: Keystone XL pipeline © CAPP / Fox News as featured on the Daily Show. Photo 2: The Democrat hopefuls and John Stewart on the Daily Show. Photo 3: John Stewart’s “Obama & the Pussycrats”, The Daily Show, November 6, 2014 © Comedy Central / Daily Show November, 2014. © Graph: Oil benchmark prices 5-day assessment October/November 2014 © Gaurav Sharma 2014.

An instructive approach to energy trading tenets

In the challenging world of energy trading, fortune favours the prepared. Whether one is brave enough (or not) comes second and not having a clear strategy would be borderline foolishness.

Given such a backdrop, almost inevitably, there are resources aplenty targeting those who feel the need to be better informed and equipped. Among the latest reference sources, industry veteran and academic Dr Iris Marie Mack’s book Energy Trading and Risk Management published by Wiley is a pretty compelling one.

The Oilholic instantly warmed up to the book barely a chapter in, struck by its practical approach, balanced tone, contextualised narrative and a genuine desire on the author’s part to define terms and methodologies for the benefit of those with a mid-tier investment knowledge base.

Furthermore, the instructive narrative seeks to bring about a holistic understanding of how energy markets work to begin with, leading on to an adequate treatment of risk, speculation and portfolio diversity tenets. The format in which Energy Trading and Risk Management is minutely sub-sectioned point to point is simply splendid. So should you wish to salami slice and pick up bits of the subject, it would serve you just as well as a cover to cover read through.

Conversely, if you are confident enough to skip the basics and go straight through to concepts and formulas, the sequential flow of text in each chapter helps you breeze through basic definitions usually quoted in boxed text on to what you are after.

Accompanying the text are charts, case studies, background briefs, notes on macro drivers and definitions at various points split into ten weighty sub-sectioned chapters in a book of around 270 pages. From contango to the modern portfolio theory, from risk management in the renewables business to mitigation in an ever changing market climate – it’s all there and duly referenced.

While the Oilholic appreciated Dr Mack's work in its entirety, a chapter on exotic energy derivatives (which follows a passage on the plain vanilla variety) stood out for this blogger. One would be happy to recommend this title to energy professionals, fellow energy analysts and those with a desire to pursue energy trading as a career pathway.

It would most definitely appeal to entrants finding their feet in the market as well as established participants wanting to refresh their thinking and methodologies. Ultimately, for every reader this title is bound to morph from being an informative and educational book at the point of first reading, to an invaluable reference source as and when subsequently needed. That makes it worthy of any energy sector professional’s bookshelf.

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© Gaurav Sharma, October, 2014. Photo: Front Cover – Energy Trading and Risk Management © Wiley Publishers, May, 2014.