David Fuller and Eoin Treacy's Comment of the Day
Category - Energy

    OPEC and Russia Ready to Extend Oil-Supply Cuts Through 2018

    This article by Elena Mazneva, Laura Hurst and Javier Blas for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

    OPEC and Russia are ready to extend their oil production cuts until the end of next year to ensure global stockpiles keep falling and prices maintain recent gains.

    All OPEC members and Russia, the biggest producer outside the group to join the deal, agree the cuts should last until the end of 2018, according to delegates in Vienna to attend Thursday’s meeting. On Wednesday, a committee charged with overseeing the agreement on behalf of the whole group also recommended extending until the end of next year, two delegates said.

    "Everybody’s working toward that nine-month extension,” Nigerian Petroleum Minister Emmanuel Kachikwu said in a Bloomberg television interview.

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    Mine Shutdown Heats Up Uranium Prices

    Thanks to a subscriber for this article from Barron’s which may be of interest. Here is a section:

    Cameco (ticker: CCJ), which provides roughly 17% of the world’s uranium production, announced on Nov. 8 that it will temporarily suspend production at its McArthur River mining and Key Lake milling operations in Canada by the end of January. It blamed weakness in uranium prices, which it said had fallen by more than 70% since the Fukushima accident in March 2011. McArthur River is the world’s largest high-grade uranium mine.

    The news sent weekly spot prices for uranium up by nearly $3, to $23 a pound, on Nov. 13, according to nuclear-fuel consultancy Ux Consulting. Weekly prices stood at $20.25 a pound on Nov. 6, ahead of the announcement, holding in the tight range of $19.25 and $20.75 they had traded at from late May. January uranium futures traded on Globex settled at $24.40 on Thursday. “This is the last gasp of the uranium bear market,” says Christopher Ecclestone, a mining strategist at investment bank and research firm Hallgarten & Co., adding that the market is likely to “perk up” from here

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    Musings From The Oil Patch November 21st 2017

    Thanks to a subscriber for this edition of Allen Brooks’ ever interesting, and occasionally controversial, report for PPHB. Here is a section: 

    Between 2010 and 2016, coal’s share of U.S. energy fell from 23% to 15.8%, while renewables’ share climbed from 1.7% to 3.7%.  In the EU, coal’s share fell from 16% to 14.5%, and renewables more than doubled its share, going from 3.9% to 8.3%.  This emissions and economic progress by the EU is in jeopardy following the election of President Trump who is determined to boost U.S. oil, natural gas and coal industries, and push back on green mandates and subsidies.  The EU’s response has been to isolate the United States for its climate position.  Their strategy for overcoming high energy costs and exposure to energy disruptions is to make people choose expensive renewable energy in the guise of it being the only logical choice when confronted with the alternative of a disastrous environmental outcome if we continue burning fossil fuels.  

    As the EU’s strategy seems not to be working as well as planned, it has become more radical with governments seeking to ban internal combustion engine cars.  This, its leaders believe, will force American auto companies to compete in the marketplace of zero-emission vehicles.  Little is mentioned about the fact that the carbon emissions legacy associated with building electric cars requires years of driving them before it is neutralized.  Electric car promoters also never mention the environmental and social costs of mining the rare earth minerals required in rechargeable batteries.  If fairly presented, people might question whether there are other alternative solutions that are less-costly and do more to mitigate the environmental hazards of electric batteries and renewable energy sources.  

    While the goal to level the economic playing field with respect to energy’s cost in manufacturing remains an EU objective, the path to achieving that goal has changed.  The choice presented is impending environmental disaster with continued use of fossil fuels versus feeling good about saving the planet with high cost renewables and zero-emission electric vehicles.  Expect more of rhetoric as we move forward.  Maybe President Trump understands that the climate change movement is really an economic war in the guise of climate change.

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    World's Biggest Wealth Fund Wants Out of Oil and Gas

    This article by Sveinung Sleire for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section:

     

    Norway, which relies on oil and gas for about a fifth of economic output, would be less vulnerable to declining crude prices without its fund investing in the industry, the central bank said Thursday. The divestment would mark the second major step in scrubbing the world’s biggest wealth fund of climate risk, after it sold most of its coal stocks.

    “Our perspective here is to spread the risks for the state’s wealth,” Egil Matsen, the deputy central bank governor overseeing the fund, said in an interview in Oslo. “We can do that better by not adding oil-price risk.”

    The plan would entail the fund, which controls about 1.5 percent of global stocks, dumping as much as $40 billion of shares in international giants such as Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell Plc. The Finance Ministry said it will study the proposal and decide what to do in “fall of 2018” at the earliest.

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    Rio Tinto joins race for stake in world's largest lithium miner

    Rio Tinto joins race for stake in world’s largest lithium miner – This article by Cecilia Jamasmie for Mining.com may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section: 

     

    El Mostrador suggested Tinto Rio had already made a bid, potentially trumping Chinese companies Sinochem, Tianqi and GSR Capital, all of which had also expressed interest in SQM.

    The news came on the heels of PotashCorp and Agrium announcing Tuesday that China’s ministry of commerce had approved the merger, but required the sale of PotashCorp’s minority holdings in Arab Potash Company and SQM within 18 months of closing, and Israel Chemicals Ltd. within nine months.

    SQM, which has a market value at just over $15 billion, produced roughly 44 million tonnes of lithium carbonate last year and is developing new projects in Chile and Australia.

    Rio's current incursion in the lithium market is mostly limited to its 100%-owned lithium and borates mineral project in Jadar, Serbia, which is still in the early stages of development.

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    Email of the day on feudalism in the modern era

    I was thinking back to our dinner at the club in LA, and remembering that you stated that the Princes of the Sauds owed allegiance to their King, comparing them to the Barons of Europe in the middle ages. You said that sooner or later, the finances of the Kingdom would have to be enhanced, and that the Princes would be called upon to do so, just as the Barons of long ago were required to collect taxes and give treasure to the Crown. The parallels between today in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and those days so long ago are amazing!

    We have now seen the first round of the tax collection begin, and those who were arrested were quite likely opposing the new "taxes", if not plotting actual rebellion (in which case they will almost certainly be executed). There is a clear message here for the rest of the Princes...

    Now this is the stuff that historians truly love. 

     

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    Britain risks a nuclear dead end by spurning global technology leap

    Thanks to a David for this article from Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in the Telegraph. Here is a section: 

    A few million will be put aside for ‘blue sky’ research but the real money will go to a consortium led by Rolls-Royce to develop a series of 440 megawatt SMRs for £2.5bn each, drawing on Rolls’ experience building PWR3 reactors for nuclear submarines. The company bills it as part of a “national endeavour’ that will create 40,000 skilled jobs. It requires matching start-up funds of £500m from the state. 

    I find myself torn since these ambitions are commendable. They revive a homegrown British sector, akin to the success in aerospace. It is exactly what Theresa May’s industrial strategy should be. Rolls-Royce is a superb company with layers of depth and a global brand. It could genuinely hope to capture an export bonanza.  

    Yet the venture looks all too like a scaled-down version of Sizewell, plagued by the same defects as the old reactors, less flexible than advertised, and likely to spew yet more plutonium waste.  

    Rolls Royce insists that the design is novel and can slash costs by relying on components small enough to be manufactured in factories. “Everything can be cut down to size and put on a lorry,” said a spokesman.  

    Rolls-Royce has said the design can slash costs by relying on components small enough to be manufactured in factories It aims for £65 MWh by the fifth plant, dropping to £60 once the scale is ramped up to seven gigawatts (GW), with exports targeting a putative £400bn global market.  

     

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    Venezuela Will Seek to Restructure Debt, Blaming Sanctions

    This article by Katia Porzecanski, Patricia Laya, Ben Bartenstein, and Christine Jenkins for Bloomberg may be of interest to subscribers. Here is a section: 

    Prices on PDVSA’s $3 billion of bonds maturing in 2027 were quoted at 20 cents on the dollar at 9:23 a.m. in London, according to pricing source CBBT. Venezuelan government bonds maturing in 2018 slid 16 cents on the dollar to 63 cents, while longer-maturity debt was little changed.

    Even after the oil producer known as PDVSA made an $842 million principal payment Oct. 27, the nation is behind on about $800 million of interest payments. All told, there’s $143 billion in foreign debt owed by the government and state entities, with about $52 billion in bonds, according to Torino Capital.

    Sanctions imposed in August by the U.S. have made it difficult to raise money from international investors, and effectively prohibit refinancing or restructuring existing debt, because they block U.S.-regulated institutions from buying new bonds. It’s an unprecedented situation for bondholders, who have limited recourse as long as sanctions are in effect.

    “I decree a refinancing and restructuring of external debt and all Venezuelan payments,” Maduro said. “We’re going to a complete reformatting. To find an equilibrium, and to cover the necessities of the country, the investments of the country.”

     

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    Musings From The Oil Patch November 7th 2017

    Thanks to a subscriber for this edition of Allen Brooks’ everinteresting report for PPHB which may be of interest. Here is a section: 

    The euphoria that greeted the production cut agreement announcement lifted oil prices above $50 a barrel, a critical threshold for market confidence.  As global oil inventories failed to drop as the market expected, investors turned on the commodity as well as energy stocks, sending their prices lower.  Since the oil price drop in early 2007, prices have largely traded between the low $40s a barrel to now above $54, with a brief excursion as low as $26.  The narrow price range reflected global oil inventories remaining relatively flat, until recently.  As oil inventories started falling a few weeks ago, we are now in a period favorable for higher prices.  

    Today, we are firmly planted in an oil market reflecting positive price momentum.  Better projected oil demand growth seemed to be the initial factor that helped lift the oil market.  The International Energy Agency (IEA) upped its demand growth estimates for the second half of 2017.  About the same time, U.S. shale producers began shedding oil drilling rigs in response to weakening oil prices and as they sensed a need to rebuild investor confidence in their financial health.  Producers had to dispel the image of exploration and production (E&P) companies as destroyers of capital, a label the industry’s record seemed to warrant.  Disciplined capital spending, meaning living within a company’s cash flow in order to not have to borrow money or sell more equity to fund the overspending, appears to be the new mantra for E&P companies.  The latest survey of E&P company spending plans versus cash flow demonstrates that overspending remains high.  This may signal that it will take time for companies to generate positive cash flow.  

    In recent weeks, as Brent oil prices have risen at a faster rate than WTI oil, the forward oil price curve moved into backwardation, meaning that barrels of oil able to be delivered immediately are worth more than if they are stored and delivered in the future.  This price disparity is further impacted by the cost of storing the oil.  Backwardation encourages holders of oil in storage to begin selling those barrels, which has accelerated the shrinking of global oil inventories.   

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