- WTI is up 18c to $53.66/Bbl, and Brent is up 42c to $59.93/Bbl
- Oil prices were up nearly 2% this morning, before giving back the gains, after reported attacks in Saudi Arabia by Houthi rebels
- Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi’s have targeted facilities in Jizan, Saudi Arabia on the Red Sea (Reuters)
- A military spokesman told Al Masirah TV that the group had also targeted the Abha and Jizan airports, Khamis Mushait military base and other sensitive targets in Saudi Arabia
- AEGIS notes that so far no news of supply disruptions have been reported
- The number of coronavirus infections in China has overtaken the official number recorded during the 2003 SARS epidemic (Bloomberg)
- Airlines across the world have suspended more flights to China as governments try and stop the spread of the virus
- China’s oil throughput in February and March have been revised down by 600 MBbl/d – 1 MMBbl/d respectively by industry experts and market analysts (Platts)
- When the viral epidemic peaks, China’s product demand is forecasted to fall by 540 MBbl/d in that quarter, according to a Beijing-based analyst
- The product demand loss could be translated to 770 MBbl/d of crude throughput, according to the analyst
- EIA weekly data is due at 10:00 AM CST
- U.S. Crude Inventories: + 258 MBbls (Bloomberg surveys)
- U.S. Gasoline Inventories: + 1,613 MBbls
- U.S. Distillate Inventories: – 599 MBbls
- U.S. Refinery Utilization: – 0.55% change
- Natural gas is down 3.8c to $1.896/MMBtu
- History repeats itself as the colder-than-normal days that were forecasted in the 9-to-15-day outlook have all but disappeared after last night’s weather runs
- The European weather model lost 20 Heating Degree Days in the past 24 hours, the equivalent of 40 Bcf of demand
- India is attempting to renegotiate their oil-linked LNG supply deals with Qatar as JKM spot prices test levels below $4.00/MMBtu (Bloomberg)
- The equivalent purchase price for an oil-linked contract is approximately $9 to $10/MMBtu
- Re-negotiating long-term contracts has grown increasingly popular over the last several months as ample supply has made the cost of purchasing spot cargoes the cheaper option
- Platts notes that, in 2018, a buyer would have saved $1.00/MMBtu purchasing LNG via a Brent-linked contract rather than purchasing on the spot market
