Monday, October 14, 2019

Something To Think About On A Holiday (Sort Of) Monday -- October 14, 2019

Updates

Later, 8:15 p.m. CT: in the original post, I stated that the "OPEC figures were generated by OPEC." Apparently that is not entire correct. See first comment. A reader clarifies how OPEC figures are arrived at. For the full comment, scroll down to comments. This is the first part of a longer comment:
OPEC is aware that self-reported production figures from their members would be suspect, so instead of those they use an average of estimates from six "secondary sources," namely the IEA, the EIA, Platts, Argus, Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) and the industry newsletter Petroleum Intelligence Weekly for the production they report ...
... the Saudis, facing the IPO, reported much less damage to production from the drone attack than the official OPEC figures showed ...

... the demand estimates are their own, and they're widely followed & reported on .... estimates are always a crapshoot, but they have to make them as good as they can because their credibility is on the line... 
 Again, see comments for the rest of that comment.

Original Post

From overnight, from a reader who probably follows global oil and natural gas trends more closely than anyone. The reader suggests he may be the first one reporting this:
OPEC has estimated that during the 3rd quarter of this year, all oil consuming regions of the globe have been using 100.70 million barrels of oil per day, which was revised from their estimate of 100.63 million barrels of oil per day for the 3rd quarter a month ago....
... meanwhile, from OPEC's own figures, OPEC and the rest of the world's oil producers were only producing 97.32 million barrels per day during September, which means that there was a shortage of around 3,380,000 barrels per day in global oil production when compared to the demand estimated for the month...
... in addition, the downward revision of 150,000 barrels per day to August's global output that's implied in OPEC's report, combined with the 70,000 barrel per day upward revision to 3rd quarter demand, means that the 1,450,000 barrel per day shortfall that we had originally figured for August based on last month's figures would now have to be revised to a deficit of 1,670,000 barrels per day....
... similarly, the 70,000 barrel per day upward revision to 3rd quarter demand means that the 2,220,000 barrel per day shortfall that we had originally figured for July would have to be revised to a deficit of 2,290,000 barrels per day....
... thus, he oil supply deficit for the 3rd quarter as a whole has averaged nearly 2,440,000 barrels per day...
and then this zinger:  notably, OPEC production was down 4 million barrels per day from a year ago...of course, half of that was the Saudis...but half of it wasn't..

Note:
  • those are OPEC's own figures
  • this comes at a time when Saudi is still recovering from "that" attack
  • the Mideast is flaring up again, not cooling down
  • sanctions on some oil-producing countries (Iran, Venezuela) continue to tighten with no end in sight
Ignoring the numbers, what I found most interesting about the article:
  • global demand for August was revised upward
  • half of OPEC's decreased production stemmed from outside Saudi Arabia
 It will be interesting if the EIA, the AP, Bloomberg, Reuters picks up on this.

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Notes to the Granddaughters

As I writing the subject line, ".... on a holiday (sort of) Monday...." I was  reminded of the wonderful holidays I had when I was on temporary duty in northern England between 2002 and 2004. Yorkshire, England.

My most memorable single-day Monday holiday: visiting Haworth, England. Brontë - ville.

It was also this time of year that meteor-watching / meteor-gazing was at its best. Wow, those were wonderful days.

Meanwhile, here in north Texas: pollen season. Riding my work into work and I end up sneezing for about an hour after reaching my destination.

2 comments:

  1. in re: "Note: those are OPEC's own figures"

    OPEC is aware that self-reported production figures from their members would be suspect, so instead of those they use an average of estimates from six "secondary sources", namely the IEA, the EIA, Platts, Argus, Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA) and the industry newsletter Petroleum Intelligence Weekly for the production they report...the Saudis, facing the IPO, reported much less damage to production from the drone attack than the official OPEC figures showed...

    the demand estimates are their own, and they're widely followed & reported on....estimates are always a crapshoot, but they have to make them as good as they can because their credibility is on the line..

    when reporting on this report. the media usually goes to the summary on demand and pulls a few lines they don't understand and reports them (you'll recall the fiasco wherein they reported that "demand growth" was revised lower even though demand for both years was revised higher)...trouble is, 30 or 40 pages separate OPECs production figures and their demand estimates and no one reports on both, and crucially the difference between them...that's what prompted my crack last night that it would take the media at least a year to figure out what's happening right here now, in mid-October..

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    1. 'Thirty to forty pages" separate the "demand chapter" from the "production chapter." LOL. Journalists have deadlines to meet; having to read more than two pages is more than they can possibly handle. My hunch: those that actually do read the report (less than 1%), read the "demand chapter" one month, and the "production chapter" the next month (two different reports). Pretty funny.

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