Phil Flynn, Alaron
Wet barrels dry barrels dry barrels what does it matter? Sometimes you need to focus on liquids and other times you have to focus on liquidity. Liquids things you can see or you can look to the obscure massive amounts of liquidity that continues to be pumped into the system to keep the economy afloat. For the second week in a row a bearish petroleum supply report is only bearish long enough to distract oil traders for the larger issues at hand.
Those burning issues are weak dollar and the hope for global economic recovery. More talk that China may be stronger than it seems and the greenback that cannot seem to get a bid against a backdrop of a record budget deficit and a weaker than expected economic data. Oh sure weaker US data may be bad for energy demand but traders think that it could be worse for the dollar. It is hard to get excited about an ADP employment index that estimated a loss of 371,000 jobs in July and an ISM number that showed that U.S. non-manufacturing industries contracted for the 10th consecutive month in July falling from to 46.4% in July from 47% in June. It might be bearish for energy demand but at the same time it sends a signal that the Fed will not take its foot off the liquidity accelerator anytime soon.
Of Course when it comes to liquid petroleum we have plenty of that as well. The Department of Energy reported that commercial crude oil inventories increased by 1.7 million barrels putting them a whopping 18.4% above year ago levels. Supplies in Cushing Oklahoma are bursting and rose by 1.2 million barrels to 33.3 million barrels. G gasoline inventories decreased by 0.2 million barrels last and the DOE says that they are in the upper half of the average range. Both finished gasoline inventories and gasoline blending components decreased last week. Distillate fuel inventories decreased by 1.1 million barrels, and are above the upper boundary of the average range for this time of year.
As For Natural Gas Dow Jones reported that the shutdown of an Enterprise Products Partners (EPD) gas processing platform in the Gulf of Mexico due to a fire helped rally natural gas futures. The plant connects to interstate pipeline systems. Dow quoted Angus Jackson Inc as saying that there’s also a conscious effort by pipeline by operators to cut back production by doing unscheduled maintenance, which has also created higher prices.
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Republished with permission from Alaron’s Energy Report Daily.
