Last week saw the release of OPEC's November Oil Market Report, which includes the details on OPEC's & global oil data for October, and hence it gives us a picture of the global oil supply & demand situation as Chinese demand grew faster than expected, after their first half recovery from the country's restrictive Covid policy had stalled over the summer, while oil supplies continued to be impacted by the the most recent unilateral million barrel per day production cut by the Saudis.
US oil data from the US Energy Information Administration for the week ending December 16th indicated that after a big drop in our oil imports and a big decrease in those mysterious oil supplies that could not be accounted for, we needed to pull oil out of our stored commercial crude supplies for the 5th time in 6 weeks, and for the 16th time in the past 35 weeks, despite another sizable release of oil from the SPR.
US oil data from the US Energy Information Administration for the week ending July 22nd indicated that despite another large oil withdrawal from the SPR, increased production from our wells, and a refinery slowdown, we still needed to withdraw oil from our stored commercial crude supplies for the 4th time in 6 weeks, and for the 21st time over the past 35 weeks, mostly because of another big increase in our oil exports.
Tuesday of the past week saw the release of OPEC's July Oil Market Report, which includes details on OPEC & global oil data for June, and hence it gives us a picture of the global oil supply & demand situation at a time when Chinese demand was curtailed by restrictive Covid lockdowns, while the supply of Russian oil was curtailed by sanctions imposed by the West
US oil supplies are at a 13½ year low, but oil exports are at a 8 month high; SPR is at a 19½ year low after biggest draw since August 2011; gasoline exports are at a 39 month high; distillate supplies are at a 95 month low; total oil + products supplies also at a 95 month low after across the board drawdowns
In the 2016 election campaign, Donald Trump promised to reform the H-1B work visa program. That should have been the least controversial of his plans, as the visa has long been recognized by both major parties as having major problems. Almost all the major candidates in 2016 — Trump, Cruz, Rubio, Clinton and Sanders — were critical of the program.
Wednesday of this past week saw the release of OPEC's June Oil Market Report, which covers OPEC & global oil data for May, and hence it gives us a picture of the global oil supply & demand situation during the first month of the two month agreement between OPEC, the Russians, and other oil producers to cut production by 9.7 million barrels a day from an elevated October 2018 baseline.
Thursday of this past week saw the release of OPEC's April Oil Market Report, which gives us a picture of the global oil supply & demand situation in March, after the breakdown of OPECs agreement to cut oil production in the first quarter, when Saudi and its allies were engaged in an oil price war against the Russians and US shale, but before last week's agreement to cut production by 9.7 million barrels a day.
This week we're going to review OPEC's August Oil Market Report (covering July OPEC & global oil data). As you’ll see, it shows there was a large shortfall in the amount of oil produced in July, a story that doesn’t seem to be being told elsewhere, as even the analysts don’t read the entire report (100+ pages)
Since the media largely missed what the data from OPEC's February Oil Market Report (covering January OPEC & global oil data) actually showed, and since Saudi jawboning about oil supply and demand in advance of the Aramco IPO has been keyed to keeping oil prices higher, we'll take a quick look at that report, which is available as a free download.
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