Energy

Crude Oil Price Staggers After Larger-Than-Expected Increase in Inventories

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The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released its weekly petroleum status report Thursday morning, one day later than usual due to the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday. U.S. commercial crude inventories increased by 2.3 million barrels last week, maintaining a total U.S. commercial crude inventory of 485.5 million barrels. The commercial crude inventory is near the upper limit of the average range for this time of year.

Wednesday evening the American Petroleum Institute (API) reported that crude inventories dropped by 5 million barrels in the week ending January 13. API also reported gasoline supplies increased by a massive 9.75 million barrels and distillate inventories increased by 1.75 million barrels. For the same period, analysts surveyed by The Wall Street Journal had estimated an increase of 100,000 barrels in crude inventories, a rise of 1.7 million barrels in gasoline stockpiles and an increase of 100,000 barrels in distillates.

Total gasoline inventories increased by 6 million barrels last week, according to the EIA and have now topped the upper limit of the five-year average range. Total motor gasoline supplied (the agency’s measure of consumption) averaged about 8.6 million barrels a day for the past four weeks, down by 2.4% compared with the same period a year ago.

A report published on Wednesday by energy industry research firm Rystad Energy indicated that total new offshore discoveries of liquid resources in 2016 amounted to just 2.3 billion barrels. That’s a drop of 90% compared with new liquids discoveries in 2010.

The liquids replacement ratio — that is, the ratio between new discoveries and yearly production — was below 10% in 2016. Just three years ago the liquids replacement ratio was about three times as high.

In 2010, for example, Brazil added nearly 20 billion barrels in offshore liquids to its reserves; in 2016, there was no significant addition to reserves, largely due to lack of capital investment. Low crude prices do not support high-cost deepwater projects of the sort Brazil undertakes to develop its offshore resources.

Norway, another major offshore producer, made no new discovery in 2016 greater than 100 million barrels. Major discoveries in the Arctic waters offshore of Russia are unlikely to be developed soon because Russia lacks the expertise to do the work by itself and the development expenses cannot be offset with low crude oil prices.

Rystad’s analysts conclude:

Rystad Energy expects the exploration activity to slowly pick up from 2018, allowing for more discoveries towards the end of this decade and beyond. At the same time, some of the recent license awards could open new prospective exploration regions, e.g. the deepwater license award in Mexico.

Before the EIA report, benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude for February delivery traded up about 1.3% at around $52.50 a barrel, and it slipped to $51.60 after the report’s release. WTI crude settled at $51.89 on Wednesday. The 52-week range on March futures is $35.59 to $56.24.

Distillate inventories decreased by 1.0 million barrels last week and remain above the upper limit of the average range for this time of year. Distillate product supplied averaged over 3.5 million barrels a day over the past four weeks, up 6.6% compared with the same period last year. Distillate production averaged over 4.7 million barrels a day last week, down about 600,000 barrels compared with the prior week’s production.

For the past week, crude imports averaged about 8.4 million barrels a day, down by about 674,000 barrels a day compared with the previous week. Refineries were running at 90.7% of capacity, with daily input averaging about 16.5 million barrels, about 639,000 barrels a day less than the previous week’s average.

According to AAA, the current national average pump price per gallon of regular gasoline is $2.332, down from $2.356 a week ago and up nine cents compared with the month-ago price. Last year at this time, a gallon of regular gasoline cost $1.882 on average in the United States.

Here is a look at how share prices for two blue-chip stocks and two exchange traded funds reacted to this latest report.

Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) traded down about 1.6%, at $84.94 in a 52-week range of $72.61 to $95.55. Over the past 12 months, Exxon stock has traded up about 11% and is down about 16.4% since August 2014, as of Wednesday’s close.

Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX) traded down about 0.5%, at $115.36 in a 52-week range of $78.02 to $119.00. As of last night’s close, Chevron shares have added more than 38% over the past 12 months and also trade down about 13.2% since August 2014.

The United States Oil ETF (NYSEMKT: USO) traded up about 0.4%, at $11.20 in a 52-week range of $7.67 to $12.45.

The VanEck Vectors Oil Services ETF (NYSEMKT: OIH) traded up about 0.1% to $34.25, in a 52-week range of $21.08 to $36.35.

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