The Fatih & Mohammed show enlivens CERA Week 2018

The Oilholic is back in Houston town, for IHS CERA Week, one of the oil and gas industry’s premier event, and so far its all about the tussle between US shale producers and OPEC/non-OPEC ‘supergroup’. 

Before the things gained traction on the first day of the week-long event, the International Energy Agency (IEA) emphatically declared the US would dominate oil production over the next five years, and is well on its way to becoming the world’s number one oil producer ahead of Russia and Saudi Arabia. (Here’s the Oilholic’s Forbes report). 

The IEA’s inimitable Executive Director Dr Fatih Birol also pointed out that describing the think-tank as an ‘oil consumers’ club’ is becoming clichéd these days as four of its members – the US, Canada, Brazil and Norway, were accounting for much of the world’s oil production growth.

Meanwhile, OPEC Secretary Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo, who is also in town, made it known that the OPEC/non-OPEC production cut underpinned by Saudi Arabia and Russia has been a success, and making a tangible impact in rebalancing the market.

So post-luncheon, both men took to the stage with Daniel Yergin, Vice Chairman of IHS Markit, for  a delightful, somewhat testy but good natured, exchange. 

Barkindo declared the OPEC and non-OPEC production cut has been “efficient”, “surpassed expectations” and “brought optimism to the market.”

Birol said that optimism was most apparent in the US, with shale producers, well...producing at a canter, and positioning themselves to cater to robust oil demand from India and China. Providing an undercurrent to his stance, was the news that India was taking it first US natural gas consignment, a mere nine months after inking an agreement to import American crude. 

Of course, Birol warned that oil and gas investment was lagging, with 2018 investment valuation projected to rise by only 6% on an annualised basis. 

Barkindo declared that was “not in the interest of the global economy.”

Via production cuts, the 24 OPEC and non-OPEC producers were providing “insurance and stability” to the global market; a move that was open to “all producers,” he added. 

Of course, US producers driven by the spirit of private enterprise, are not really queuing up to join anytime soon. So what should they do? “Enjoy”, quipped Birol, to peals of laughter in the room. 

And so it went, but the Oilholic suspects you get the gist. Elsewhere on day one, Total CEO Patrick Pouyanné said in the crude industry size does matter, and that a lower price environment gives bigger players opportunities to make strategic acquisitions. 

“It’s good to be a large integrated oil and gas company. Key to success is stable investment, regardless of oil price,” he added. 

Plenty more to come from CERA Week, but that’s all from Houston for the moment folk. Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2018. Photo: (Left to right) IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol, OPEC Secretary General Mohammed Sanusi Barkindo and IHS Markit Vice Chairman Daniel Yergin speak at CERA Week 2018 © Gaurav Sharma 2018. 

Crude price fluctuation versus ‘Big Oil’ dividends

It has been another crazy fortnight in the crude markets, with Brent not only having retreated from $70 per barrel, but trading below $65, as the Oilholic pens his thoughts.

In any case, having a $70-plus six-month price target is increasingly odd, given the current set of circumstances, let alone a projection by Goldman Sachs of $82.5 per barrel, as one recently wrote on Forbes.

That said, a possible Saudi-Russian, or should we call it a R-OPEC, reaffirmation of keeping oil production down, accompanied by constantly rising Indian oil imports and stabilising OECD inventories, should give the bulls plenty of comfort. Let’s also not forget the global economy is growing at a steady pace across all regions for the first time since the global financial crisis.

The aforementioned do count as unquestionable upsides for the oil price. But here’s the thing – should you believe in average global demand growth projections in the optimistic range of 1.5 to 1.7 million barrels per day (bpd); such growth levels could be comfortably met by growth in non-OPEC production alone.

For the moment, there’s little afoot to convince the Oilholic to change his view of a $65 per barrel average Brent price, and $60 per barrel average WTI price for 2018. So what impact would this have on ‘Big Oil’.

Interestingly enough, Morgan Stanley flagged up the 'curious case' of Big Oil dividend growth in a recent note to clients, pointing out that despite recent share price declines influenced by crude market volatility, unexpected dividend growth is still being achieved by European oil majors thanks to rapidly improving financial performance.

According to the global investment bank, in 2017, Royal Dutch Shell, BP, Total and Statoil generated $29.6 billion in organic free cash flow; the highest level since 2009. Return on average capital employed is also improving and balance sheet gearing is falling as well.

“Several management teams were willing to translate stronger cash generation in dividend increases", Morgan Stanley added.

The investment bank opined that Statoil’s cash flow and dividend growth remain impressive, so do BP’s, but noted that the latter will not be able keep up with Total and, ultimately, Shell on dividend growth.

Hard to keep up with Shell in any case; the Anglo-Dutch giant has a sterling record of regularly and dutifully paying dividends dating all the way back to the Second World War. That’s all for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2018. Photo: Oil well in Oman © Royal Dutch Shell.

Those loud political bangs in Riyadh

Riyadh, capital of the world’s most prolific of crude oil producing nation – Saudi Arabia – has been rocked by both physical and political bangs this weekend, the Oilholic notes. Overnight, state TV confirmed the Saudis had intercepted a ballistic missile aimed at Riyadh's King Khaled Airport fired by Yemen’s Houthi rebels.

Witnesses reported loud bangs and parts of the destroyed missile were found in the airport’s car park. The Saudis are leading a campaign to defeat the Houthis, as part of an international air coalition that has bombed the rebel group since 2015. Who else, but Iran, purportedly backs the rebels. 

Following the physical bang, came the political bang later in the day in the form of surprise dismissals and arrests of dozens of Saudi ministers, royals, officials and senior military officers by the country’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. 

Even by secretive Saudi standards, the move is unprecedented. It points to an audacious attempt by the Prince to consolidate his power base and move closer to his ultimate objective of ascending to the country’s throne.

His father King Salman has been doing his bit too. Under convention, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, a seasoned royal, was first in line to the throne to succeed Salman. But the King ousted him from the line of succession and stripped him of his role as interior minister.

Earlier in his reign, King Salman had removed his half-brother Prince Muqrin from the line of succession. By April 2015, the king had appointed Prince Mohammed bin Salman as second-in-line to the throne, giving him the title of deputy crown prince, a move that surprised many senior members of the ruling Saud family.

Now through what on paper appears to be an anti-corruption purge, the father-son duo have all but made sure of Mohammed bin Salman’s safe passage to the throne. However, in highly tribal Saudi Arabia, reports suggest the move has not gone down well. 

How it all plays out in terms of geopolitical risk and the impact all of this could have on the oil price remains to be seen. For now at least, it’s just a few crude bangs, albeit at a time the oil price is back above July 2015 levels. That’s all for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it crude!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Photo: Oil extraction facility in the Middle East © Shell.

A bearish view from New York

Its great to be back in New York on a part business, part pleasure adventure.

Of course, on visits like these, yours truly almost, always catches up with known crude traders and analysts to get a sense of how they are feeling about the direction of the market.

More so as market mood is a fickle thing,  and we are currently staring at an oil price jump predicated on the first single-digit decline in US rig counts for over 22 weeks. But seriously is that enough to go long? 

Not quite according to majority of traders yours truly has met in Manhattan; some 8 out of 10 remain net short and say the rally won't last. Almost all believe that US production would cap 10 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2018, and that we should not read much into the price uptick of the past week. Consensus here is that while the market is showing nominal signs of rebalancing, a short-term bounce of appreciable magnitude is not on the horizon. 

Furthermore, OPEC faces a damned if you do and damned if you don't dilemma. Much of its cuts are coming at the expense of market share based on raw data. Whenever that has happened in recent history, the oil price has slipped too in most cases, in step with OPEC's lower market share, as the Oilholic noted in a recent Forbes piece authored last week from here. 

The other problem is - should OPEC decide to pump more, or move to protect its market share, that would mean more barrels on the market and a subsequent bearish impact. 

And on that note, and armed with some bearish feedback from the Big Apple, its time for the Olympics of the oil and gas business; yup that would be the 22nd World Petroleum Congress in Istanbul, Turkey. Goodbye from NYC folks, and more from Istanbul soon! Keep reading, keep it crude!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Photo: Skyline of New York, USA photographed from the city's Empire State Building © Gaurav Sharma 2017. 

To boldly go where no US oil patch has gone before!

The NASA inspired car showroom photographed by the Oilholic some months ago in Houston, Texas could sum up the US oil patch's inspirational streak. Its going where, quite possibly, no US oil patch has gone before. 

Sentiment is rapidly rising in favour of US production capping an all time high in 2018 of (well in excess of) 10 million barrels per day (bpd). 

If achieved, that would be the highest US production on record, well above 1980s Texan boom and more recently, when both Dakotas put the word ‘revolution’ and in the shale revolution we’ve now become so accustomed to. 

The other leveller of course, is innovation. With extraction costs having declined dramatically and oilfield services firms' offerings to exploration and production companies getting ever more competitive, some with viable shale plays can keep going even at a $30 per barrel oil price. 

Here’s the Oilholic’s assessment in a recent Forbes post. Inventories may not have quite rebalanced, while more oil is on the way. That's all for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it crude!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Photo: Exterior of NASA-themed car dealership in Houston, Texas, USA © Gaurav Sharma 2017. 

No surprises! OPEC & non-OPEC cuts rolled over for 9 months

If you were secretly hoping for a surprise at the 172nd OPEC ministers' meeting, consider your hopes dashed, as things went perfectly according to script.

Except of course Equatorial Guinea became the 14th member of OPEC out of the blue, and with little prior intimation to half of the world's press. 

That meant 24 oil producers - including 10 non-OPEC nations led by Russia, and 14 OPEC participants headed by kingpin Saudi Arabia - rolled over their 1.8 million barrels per day (bpd) output cut to March 2018. 

Libya and Nigeria were exempt, Iran will be given some leeway, and Russia reaffirmed it was sticking to its 300,000 bpd pledge; the largest non-OPEC output cut of its kind on paper. (Here's the full IBTimes UK report). 

Big question is where from here? If Saudi Oil Minister Khalid Al-Falih is to be believed, this is all about rebalancing the market back to its five-year average. Problem here is that a buffer producer in the shape of the US keeps plugging away with some predicting its output to touch 10 million bpd in 2018. 

Were that to be the case, is OPEC not in effect subsidising shale players? Thrice yours truly asked Al-Falih whether that was the case, and thrice the question was ignored. The Oilholic is not convinced the extension of this cut would provide short-term support to the oil price that some are hoping for. 

In fact the initial response of the market has been something of a mini selloff, as many were hoping the cuts would either be deepened or be extended by 12 months. Nether happened, but the market got plenty of food for thought. That's all from Vienna in this instance folks. More when the Oilholic can make a more considered assessment and has gathered his thoughts. Till then, keep reading, keep it crude!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Exterior of OPEC Secretariat, Vienna, Austria © Gaurav Sharma 2017. 

Seems to be a done deal at OPEC

The Oilholic is back in Vienna, Austria for the 172nd OPEC Ministers meeting, and this blogger's 10th year of covering 'crude' matters. Oh how time flies! 

However, on this occasion, it looks like a done deal here at Helferstorferstrasse 17, even before things have begun. 

Crude sources suggest Opec's ministerial committee has proposed an extension of output cuts ahead of a formal announcement on the matter. Here's one's IBTimes UK report on the matter. 

The source also suggested that leading oil market power brokers Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Russia have given the proposal their backing. Meanwhile, non-Opec producer Oman has said it is "not opposed" to the deal, but was seeking "more clarity and discussion" on the matter, according to newswire Reuters.

Elsewhere, the Kuwaitis are wondering if a 12-month extension to cuts was worth contemplating, something the Saudis and Russians would probably not agree to.

At 2:58pm BST, both oil benchmarks were broadly flat staying close to overnight ranges, with the Brent front-month contract at $54.24 per barrel, up 0.17% or 9 cents, and West Texas Intermediate up 0.02% or a cent at $51.46 per barrel.

Opec's formal announcement is expected at 4pm BST on Thursday. That's all for the moment from Vienna folks. Keep reading, keep it crude! 

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Photo: OPEC secretariat, Vienna, Austria © Gaurav Sharma 2017.

Onto blockchains and barrels in Houston Town

Greetings dear readers, the Oilholic is back in Houston, the oil and gas capital of the world, with OPEC soundbites from far afield having ensured Brent is back above $50 and on track to end the week higher than where it began. 

Meanwhile here, upstream innovations helping the US oil patch in this era of ‘lower for longer’ oil prices are the talk of the town, but among the digitisation platforms the crude world has started taking to with increased ferocity – the subject of blockchains – keeps propping up.

Don’t worry, yours truly was bit foxed too at the start, wondering what on earth is a blockchain, let alone its platform deployment in an industry thatm let’s face it, lags others in digitisation. 

So in simple terms, a blockchain is akin to a digitally distributed ledger that can be replicated and spread across many nodes in a peer-to-peer network, thereby minimising the need for oversight and governance of a single ledger. 

Each transaction on the ledger is recorded and added to the previous one. These additions result in a growing 'chain' of information. 

At the 2017 Baker & McKenzie Oil & Gas Institute, it was a much discussed subject, albeit included in the wider discussion on digitisation in the sector.

Here’s the Oilholic’s full report on the deliberations for IBTimes UK, which is well worth reading. While nothing is foolproof, there is growing consensus within the industry that blockchain ledgers can help fight fraud and corruption. 

As if that wasn’t enough for you on the subject of ‘crude’ digitisation, Shell’s top lawyer David Brinley also told institute delegates the oil major’s technology hub in Bangalore, India has never been more integral to its business than it is now.

"From automation to 3D printing of project prototypes, to an app on how to locate your car in a car park – Shell would like to be at the forefront of inexorable technological changes we are seeing in the 21st century." 

Away from crude chatter, the Oilholic leaves you with a glimpse of a refreshing pint at The Richmond Arms pub, which tasted even better after yours truly cheered on Manchester United to the UEFA Europa League final. 

If you happen to be in Houston, and need to watch English Premier League clubs in play, or European football (er...called socccer here) there’s no better place to watch in The Galleria area for starters, and in the whole city in some ways too.  

That’s all for the moment from Houston folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Photo 1: Chevron Towers, Downtown Houston. Photo 2: Pint at the Richmond Arms Pub, Houston. Texas, USA. © Gaurav Sharma 2017.

‘Crude’ recollections of a former OPEC bigwig

For over two decades, every word Ali Al-Naimi uttered was lapped up by the oil market. It wouldn’t be otherwise, if you were the oil minister, as he once was, of OPEC heavyweight Saudi Arabia between August 1995 and May 2016.

So when Al-Naimi’s memoir – Out of the Desert: My Journey from Nomadic Bedouin to the Heart of Global Oil – appeared on the horizon barely a few months into his retirement, global headlines were all but guaranteed, especially at a time of extreme volatility and a once in a generation market dynamic shift in the global crude world.

Yet, before the world got to know Al-Naimi as the oil market heavyweight, there was the nomadic shepherd boy born of humble beginnings in Eastern Arabia who dreamt of making it big.

In a memoir of over 300 pages, split by 19 chapters, Al-Naimi recounts his extraordinary journey, from an office boy in 1947 at oil company Aramco, to the CEO’s chair in 1988 of the then state-owned Saudi Aramco.

Al-Naimi’s recollections send the reader alternating from human interest sentiment to hard core global geopolitics, inner workings of the oil industry to the deals in the corridors of power, corporate decisions to political manipulation. There’s a bit of everything, and more of what you would come to expect of a global political figure. Afterall, power, politics and that precious natural resource called oil go hand in glove.

Having interacted in a journalistic capacity with Al-Naimi at several OPEC meets prior to his retirement, I often heard the industry veteran quip that in his career he had seen the oil price drop to as low as $2 and climb as high as $140 a per barrel. This book will help you get some perspective.

Even before it hit the shelves, media outlets as diverse Forbes, Bloomberg and the International Business Times, were writing news stories based on excerpts from it in a bid to take Al-Naimi’s thoughts and help them decode, how for instance talks between OPEC and non-OPEC oil producers would pan out.

From OPEC’s traditional mistrust of Russia, to everyone in the oil business looking at the Saudis to cut, Arab oil embargo to the collapse of Lehman Brothers, Al-Naimi has catalogued implications of such events for the oil market. For instance, Al-Naimi claims that in a situation akin to the crisis of demand seen in 2008-09, when the 2014 supply glut crisis hit, everyone expected the Saudis to act but offered no help with sharing the burden.

An already brilliant narrative is enhanced by a peppering of market anecdotes previous unheard of which the Oilholic enjoyed reading. The book’s appeal is universal. That said students of history, oil industry observers, industry analysts and geopolitics enthusiasts ought to regard it as a must read.

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© Gaurav Sharma 2017. Photo: Front Cover – Out of the Desert: My Journey from Nomadic Bedouin to the Heart of Global Oil By Ali Al-Naimi © Penguin Publishers, 2016.

Merry Christmas & a few crude notes!

Yes! Its that time of the year to wish you the dear readers of this blog the joys of the season and a very Merry Christmas, as another eventful year comes to a close. The Oilholic has been busy these past few weeks scribbling one's crude notes on oil market affairs for the International Business Times UK and Forbes. 

For starters, here is this blogger's take on US President-elect Donald Trump's nomination of ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson as his Secretary of State. 

When the news emerged, as usual there were oversimplifications in the media, saying the nomination had much to do with Tillerson being close to Russian President Vladimir Putin. However, the Oilholic believes there's much more to the appointment; Tillerson for intents and purposes would be a formidable top US diplomat, not just Putin's mate. 

Additionally, here is one's commodities market year-ender, and some predictions on gold, silver and of course crude oil for 2017. Finally, here are some reasons - as outlined on Forbes - for why methinks the oil price might not rise further beyond $60 per barrel in 2017, as there is limited upside to such an an occurrence over the next 12 months. 

That's all on Christmas day folks! Keep reading, keep it Christmasy and 'crude'!

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© Gaurav Sharma 2016. Photo: Christmas tree at Rotterdam Station, The Netherlands © Gaurav Sharma.

He’s making an inventory, checking it twice...

Full of festive cheer, he’s making a crude inventory, checking it thrice, gonna find out whose Iranian (sorry naughty) and nice – Saudi oil minister is coming to town. Nah, not really! 

For what it’s worth Khalid Al Falih actually turned up pretty late on Tuesday, just on the eve of the 171st OPEC Ministers' meeting. Having initially told a Saudi newspaper, an Opec production cut may not be needed, speaking at a pre-conference media scrum, Al-Falih said a deal could be done and would need wider cooperation within OPEC.

Separately, Suhail Al Mazroui, oil minister of the United Arab Emirates, told yours truly, for an IBTimes UK interview, that the ongoing OPEC meeting was not a make or break scenario for the oil market.

Al Mazroui admitted the last few months had seen “intense” negotiations, but added that: "However, from all signs I have seen, things are positive." 

We shall see. The Oilholic believes a final decision would go right down to the wire, and puts the chance of an agreement only at 50%. Watch this space! More from Vienna shortly folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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© Gaurav Sharma, November 2016. Photo: Khalid Al-Falih, Oil Minister of Saudi Arabia, speaks to reporters at the 171st OPEC Ministers' Meeting in Vienna, Austria on 30 November, 2016 © Gaurav Sharma, 2016.

A right royal ‘crude’ scrum

The Oilholic is back at Helferstorferstrasse 17, the OPEC secretariat in Vienna, Austria for its 171^st meeting of ministers, and boy did a fair few scribes turn-up for this one. 

In the considered opinion of yours truly, there haven’t been that many analysts and media people registering for the event since US President George W. Bush called on OPEC to cut production when the oil price was lurking around $147 per barrel in 2008 before it slid below $40 per barrel. Thankfully, the inmitable Jason Schenker, President of Presitge Economics was on hnad to provide some delightful company and some market insight.

Testing times always attract more scribes! Though this humble blogger as many of your recollect has almost, always turned up in what is now coming up to 10 years. More from Vienna shortly folks! Keep reading, keep it ‘crude’!

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Threat of the other & US energy security

The intertwining of US foreign policy with the country’s energy security has been a matter of public discourse for decades. The connection only witnessed a dilution of sorts roughly six years ago when the US shale bonanza started easing the economy’s reliance on oil imports in meaningful volumes. 

In an era of ‘lower for longer’ oil prices and shale’s contribution to US energy security being hot topics, author Sebastian Herbstreuth refreshingly reframes the country’s ‘energy dependency’ as a cultural discourse via his latest book – Oil and American Identity published by I.B. Tauris. 

In a book of 270 pages, split by six detailed chapters, Herbstreuth attempts to draw and examine a connection between the US energy business and American views on independence, freedom, consumption, abundance, progress and exceptionalism.

Stateside, foreign oil is selectively depicted as a serious threat to US national security. However, that selective depiction is contingent upon the ‘foreignness of foreign oil’ to quote the author. Herbstreuth shows how even reliable imports from the Middle East are portrayed as dangerous and undesirable because the region is particularly 'foreign' from an American point of view, while oil from friendly countries like neighbouring Canada is cast as a benign form of energy trade.

The author has somewhat controversially, and rather brilliantly, recast the history of US foreign oil dependence as a cultural history of the world’s largest energy consumer in the 20th Century.

That age-old concern about there being an existential threat to the US, as a society built on the internal combustion engine and mobility, is in part born out of the very cultural fears flagged by the author in some detail.

The striking thing is that the fear still lurks around despite the rising contribution of US shale oil and gas to US energy security. Reading Herbstreuth’s work you feel that in many ways the said fear slant is never going to go away, for it is as much a cultural issue as a geopolitical or economic one, neatly packaged by the political classes for the ultimate ‘Hydrocarbon Society’.

The Oilholic would be happy to recommend Oil and American Identity to fellow analysts, those interested in the oil and gas business and cultural studies students. Furthermore, a whole host of readers looking to ditch archaic theories and seeking a fresh perspective on the crude state of US energy politics would find Herbstreuth’s arguments to be pretty powerful.

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© Gaurav Sharma 2016. © Photo: Front Cover – Oil and American Identity © I.B. Tauris, 2016.

‘Doh-a Farce’? Brace for $35/bbl Brent?

The Oilholic is rather surprised that some people are actually surprised the Doha talks between major oil producers turned out to be a bit of a farce.

Well, in case you haven’t heard – the overhyped meeting between OPEC and non-OPEC crude producers aimed at introducing a production freeze has ended without an agreement.

Here is one’s take on the development in a Forbes column. The Iranians never turned up in the first place, and the 18 or so oil ministers who did, saw Saudi Oil Minister Ali Al-Naimi insist that there would be no coordinated oil production freeze unless the Iranians came on board. And there you have it – a predictable outcome, without the Saudis giving an inch.

So what’s next? The Oilholic deems a shot term return for Brent futures down to $35 per barrel as highly likely. If it is not achieved intraday today, we should probably get there early this week thereby wiping out some of the froth that built up ahead of the Doha non-event - unless of course breaking news of a Kuwaiti oil strike has the opposite effect. 

At the time of writing this post, both Brent and WTI front month futures contracts are trading down by over 6% and slipping towards the mid-thirties.

And here’s another prediction – one doesn’t expect OPEC to achieve anything at its next meeting in June either. Both Iran and Saudi Arabia are holding firm, and in no mood to compromise – something that is unlikely to change overnight.

Finally, cutting through all the pre and post Doha Talks hullabaloo, the Oilholic has also not altered his market forecasts – of Brent at or just below $50 per barrel by the end of 2016, supply-demand rebalancing by Q1 2017 and a medium term phase of low prices well shy of the mid-2014 highs before the price curve took a turn for the worse. That’s all for the moment folks! Keep reading, keep it crude! 

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© Gaurav Sharma 2016. Photo: Oil extraction site in Oman © Shell