Crude Oil Futures

  With Goreh-Jask pipeline coming into operation on Thursday, Hassan Rouhani, the outgoing Iranian president could not hide his jubilation for the achievement. Mr Rouhani said during the inauguration that it was built purely by the indigenous talent, referring to the Iranian engineers, architects and the technicians who were instrumental in bringing the project into reality. Iran says the new pipeline provides the country with an alternative route for its oil exports; the Strat of Hormuz, which Iran has been using for its oil exports for decades, is often a flash point, when conflicts between Iran and the West, especially the United States, flares out. The pipeline opens a new gateway to the Indian Ocean for Iranian oil exports, according to the Iranian media; Iran hopes that it can increase its daily exports from the current 300,000 bpd to 1 million bpd in the near future – of course, if the sanctions no longer, exit. The new pipeline was opened on a direct order from the outg

  The volatility that we saw in the crude oil markets has subsided somewhat as we approach the weekend, preceded by a tumultuous few days. The oil price is back in the green for both WTI and Brent, gaining 0.55% and 0.51% respectively as of 15:20 GMT. The rate of both the rise and fall of the oil price has been modest and in that context, the latter never being truly branded as a crash. It’s clear that the spread of the Delta variant, despite the success of vaccine rollout in certain developed nations, has taken its toll on the crude oil markets. The crude oil inventory build-up in the US, which had been going down for seven successive weeks, clearly shows that the spread of the pandemic is serious in the country, although the death toll is significantly lower than what it was during the previous waves of the Coronavirus. On Tuesday, the API, American Petroleum Institute, forecast that there would be a build-up in the US oil inventories – just about 800,000 barrels for the we

  As analysts in the oil sector keep their focus firmly on the spat between the two important Middle Eastern allies, they seemed to have inadvertently missed the attention on an equally important – and relevant – player in the Middle East – Iraq. Iraq has the world’s 5th largest oil reserves and is the sixth largest exporter of the commodity in the world, with India, the world’s third largest consumer, being a main buyer. Despite an increasing flow of oil revenue, the subjects in the main oil regions are often in the streets in protest against the lack of basics, not the luxuries; the absence of a steady power supply in the middle of sweltering, unbearable heat has been just one of the main grievances for months. Iran supplies a substantial amount of electricity needs of Iraq and recently suspended its supply for two reasons: Iraq owes Iran payments for the electricity; Iran has its own issues with power outages across the country, exacerbated by severe drought in some regions

  The OPEC+ finally managed to overcome the weeks of uncertainty over the direction that the group is supposed to move in the post-pandemic world, on Sunday. Hailing the agreement, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, the Saudi Energy Minister, said “consensus building is an art,” having reached the collective agreement. The disagreement between the two Arab neighbours, the UAE and Saudi Arabia that spilled into the open shocked the nations beyond the OPEC+: they used to see eye to eye on many Middle Eastern issues; they are Sunni Muslim Arab nations; they were almost like inseparable twins. They may have had their differences before as well. More often than not, the UAE and Saudi Arabia managed to settle them amicably behind the closed doors – the palace walls; the military involvement in Yemen, lifting the embargo against Qatar and starting diplomatic ties with Israel, to name but a few. As a shadow of misplaced anxiety about the onset of a world-without-fossil fuels casts over the o

  After two weeks of uncertainty, the OPEC+ is finally meeting on Sunday, the group announced yesterday. The bone of contention between the UAE and Russia that delayed the last meeting was the insistence of the UAE on increasing its baseline from 3.2 million bpd to 3.8 million bpd. If agreed, the UAE was prepared to toe the line of the OPEC+ with an increase in daily production – 400,000 bpd - from August to December 2021 and extend the capping of the output beyond April, 2022 up until December, 2022. After intense discussions between the two Middle Eastern neighbours, perhaps, with the collective mediation of the US and Russia as a catalyst, the two sides may have reached an agreement. The UAE may have won a partial victory over its ambition to raise the baseline. Whatever the outcome on the major issue, the output level will be increased by the OPEC+, sensing the mood of its customers across the globe at a very difficult time. The reaction of the oil markets at the develo