A decline in US inventories and a rise in the price of oil: With continued weakness in global supply chains since the Covid epidemic,
and with increasing tension in the Red Sea, oil prices rose to their highest level in a month.

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Oil prices rise due to a decline in US inventories and Chinese stimulus

Indications of Aggravation in Geopolitical Tensions

Oil prices rise due to a decline in US inventories and Chinese stimulus

Oil prices rose to their highest level in a month, with West Texas Intermediate crude surpassing $75 a barrel,
and Brent crude prices remaining above $80.
came after an unexpected drop in US oil inventories by more than 9 million barrels, reaching the lowest since October.
In China, the government announced a reduction in the mandatory reserve ratio for banks, indicating the adoption of additional support measures.

Oil rose due to geopolitical tensions in the Red Sea and fears of rising oil supplies from producing countries outside OPEC.

By exposing vulnerabilities in global supply chains that have persisted since the coronavirus pandemic,
the Red Sea tensions have highlighted risks from other potential flashpoints,
warned Josh Lersky, senior director of the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center in Washington.

He concluded: “If someone expects that after two years, we will be able to see the Red Sea closed
and say that this is acceptable because we have strengthened our ability to withstand near our homelands, then this is not realistic.”

The market continues to follow developments cautiously, awaiting clarifications about global growth expectations and the impact of geopolitical risks.

Indications of Aggravationgeo in Geopolitical Tensions

Amid the turquoise waters off Yemen, there are signs that tensions may be escalating.
The Pentagon announced yesterday that the United States and its allies destroyed 25 missile facilities belonging to the Houthis,
days after US President Joe Biden warned of the possibility of continuing air strikes shortly.

As for the US Deputy National Security Advisor, John Finner, he told ABC last Sunday: “Achieving deterrence is not an easy matter.
We are depleting their stocks so that they will not be able to launch many attacks over time. This will take time until we finish it.”

Late last Sunday, the United States of America announced the killing of the first two soldiers participating in military operations,
as two Navy special forces were killed during a night mission to control a sailboat, a local boat that the Houthis often use to transport supplies from Iran.

Most of the Houthi attacks occurred in and around the Bab al-Mandab area, a narrow strait through which ships pass to enter the Red Sea from the Indian Ocean.

Muhammad Al-Bukhaiti, a member of the Houthi Political Council,
pledges to continue attacks as long as the Israeli attack on the Gaza Strip and its siege continues.
He added: “We are confident of our victory regardless of the extent to which they mobilize forces.”

A decline in US inventories and a rise in the price of oil

Oil prices rise as US inventories decline

Oil prices rise as US inventories decline: on Tuesday 21st September 2021, the American Petroleum Institute (API) declared a decline in crude oil stockpiles by 6.0108 million barrels by the week ending September 17th, exceeding analysts’ expectations by 2.400 million barrels throughout the week.

Topics:

Oil prices for the week

Oil production weekly rates

Dubai’s gas tech conference report

Shell is off to the end of the year as an Ida’s consequence

Saudi Arabia remains China’s biggest oil supplier

Russia and Saudi Arabia are competing to export oil to China

Last Week

The API declared a decline in oil stockpiles by 5.437 million barrels for the last week,
while analysts’ expectations were 3.903 million barrels.

U.S. oil stockpiles lowered vastly in 2021, according to the API data it lowered by more than 76 million barrels, less than prior pandemic levels.

At the same time the latest data by Energy Information Administration (EIA) indicates that U.S oil reserves are less than 7%
than the average of the five years for the same time of the year to 417.4 million barrels.

The API declared a decline in gasoline stockpiles by 423.000 barrels for the week ending September 17th compared with last week’s decline by 2.761 million barrels.

Distillate stockpiles lowered by 2.720 million barrels this week compared with last week’s drop by 2.888 million barrels.

Cushing stockpiles dropped by 1.748 million barrels this week, while the last week drop was 1.345 million barrels.

Oil-prices-for-the-week

On Tuesday oil prices rose before data publishing, as U.S crude oil reserves weekly declined, and OPEC’s production was under market’s expectations,
also U.S. oil production lowered due to hurricane Ida. West Texas Intermediate crude rose 0.31% on Tuesday afternoon before data publishing.

At midday West Texas intermediate crude was for 70.51$, to rise 0.33$ in the week and 0.22$ throughout the day. Brent crude oil rose 0.70% at 74.44$ a barrel.

Oil production weekly rates

Lately, U.S oil production fell by more than a million barrels in the last two weeks,
to 10.1 million barrels by the week ending September 10th as hurricane Ida led to suspension of production in the Gulf of Mexico.

According to BSEE, 16.64% of GOM’s production is still offline up till now.

Dubai’s gas tech conference report

This week the world’s biggest gas traders and producers are meeting in Dubai to attend the Gas Tech conference;
this is the first face to face main action since Covid-19 struck.

According to world oil, the report mentioned that the conference is held from 21st to 23rd September at a time Europe faces a gas problem,
as gas prices are jumping to high levels.

Experts warned of electricity cuts in some countries by winter.
“We hope that winter in the northern half of the earth won’t be cold or we will face problems.” Didier Holt, French ENGIE’s deputy executive director said.

German UNIPER SE mentioned that risks in this industry credit are rising and many companies would find problems in cash.

Den Hollander, UNIPER’s commercial director, said that there wasn’t anything to say that Russia would suspend its gas supplies to Western Europe.

He also mentioned that, Russian PJSC Gazprom needed to renew its domestic market reserves
as this is one of the reasons why Russia wouldn’t be able to increase its exports.

Shell is off to the end of the year as an Ida’s consequence

Shell declared that an offshore platform run by the company would be off by the end of the year as a consequence of hurricane Ida,
as the platform got structural damages.

Shell also mentioned that another platform affected by Ida would be back to work by the end of the year.

Ida was one of the most destructive hurricanes lately, affecting gas and oil production in the Gulf of Mexico,
about 95% of oil production was off.
This week, after twenty days of Ida’s arrival to shore, more than 20% of production is still off.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA) Ida caused cumulative losses in oil supplies reaching 30 million barrels,
to be the first decline in international oil supplies in five months and also international reserves declined sharply.

The US oil production fell from 11.5 million barrels per day to 10 million barrels per day after hurricane Ida struck the Gulf coast,

according to the EIA. After three weeks of Ida, about 40% of shell offshore production in the Gulf of Mexico is still off.

Saudi Arabia remains China’s biggest oil supplier

Official Chinese data reported by Reuters on Monday shows that Saudi’s crude oil exports to China rose to 53% yearly in August,
keeping its position as the main exporter to the world’s biggest oil importer for the ninth month in a row.

In the last month China’s crude oil imports from Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest oil exporter,
rose by 53% compared with August’s 2020.To reach 1.96 million barrels,
according to Reuters’s data calculations by ton, of China’s customs general administration.

In the last few weeks the Chinese refineries began to raise their crude oil imports after a decline for months in buying oil from the spot market,
as Covid-19’s closure measures were one of the reasons why China’s oil buying from the spot market lowered.

There was another decline in importing shares due to governmental restrictions on private refineries.

Russia and Saudi Arabia are competing to export oil to China

Saudi Arabia beats Russia again to maintain the first position,
not only because the biggest oil producers in OPEC diminished their reductions,
but also China diminished its imports for private refineries in the third quarter.

Russian ESPO blend crude has a big fame in these refineries, known as “Teapots”.

Russia was the second biggest crude oil exporter to China.

Its exports rose by 12.6% throughout the year to 1.59 million barrels per day in August,
Russian exports didn’t change in the last month compared with the previous month’s 1.56 million barrels.

Last year, Saudi Arabia and its partner in OPEC Russia were competing for the first place as the biggest oil exporter to China,
the world’s biggest oil importer.