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Oil down slightly following weekly inventory report

Posted Apr 23rd 2008 3:45PM by Michael Fowlkes (RSS feed)
Filed under: International markets, Products and services, Consumer experience, Middle East, Economic data, Commodities, Oil, Federal Reserve

Oil prices have dropped slightly today following the weekly inventory report from the U.S. Department of Energy. Typically, the weekly inventory reports are able to move prices one way or the other, but this week we got mixed signals, and consequently, prices have not reacted too much in either direction.

Following the recent surge in oil prices, traders were looking for some concrete data to justify more price moves, but they were given a larger than expected decline in gasoline inventories, but higher than anticipated oil inventory numbers .

Analysts were expecting to see gasoline inventories drop by 2.1 million barrels, but the actual decline was 3.2 million barrels. Not good news for drivers that are already feeling the pain of record high gasoline prices. On the oil side, analysts had been looking to see inventories rise by 1.1 million barrels, and the actual increase was over twice that amount, at 2.4 million barrels.

Continue reading Oil down slightly following weekly inventory report

Oil prices move higher on Middle East concerns

Posted Oct 25th 2007 2:07PM by Michael Fowlkes (RSS feed)
Filed under: Major movement, International markets, Consumer experience, Middle East, Scandals, Economic data, Politics, Oil

Oil prices have picked up right where they left off yesterday, fueled by new concerns over tensions in the Middle East. Prices have moved up $1.42 on the day to $88.52 and hit an intraday high of $88.99 earlier in the session.

Yesterday, traders pushed prices higher after the U.S. Energy Department's weekly inventory report showed an unexpected decline of 5.3 million barrels, but today's extra price gains are being attributed to new violence between Israel and Lebanon. Any Middle Eastern conflicts will result in price gains, and that is exactly what we are seeing today on news that Lebanese troops fired on Israeli warplanes.

While it is true that a conflict between Israel and Lebanon would not impact supplies from the region, there is always the fear that an escalation of violence between the two would draw in the big oil players in the region. This is the first encounter since last summer's conflict between Israel and Hezbollah rebels, which pushed oil prices to last summer's highs.

Continue reading Oil prices move higher on Middle East concerns

Oil falls on gasoline inventory data

Posted May 31st 2007 1:30PM by Michael Fowlkes (RSS feed)
Filed under: Exxon Mobil (XOM), Chevron Corp (CVX), Economic data, Oil

Oil prices are retreating today following this week's report that shows gasoline inventories rising more than analysts had been expecting. So far on the day oil prices have pulled back $0.92 to $62.57 in today's action.

When The Energy Information Administration released this week's inventory report, analysts had been expecting to hear that gasoline inventories had risen by 1 million barrels, but in fact the report indicates a rise of 1.3 billion barrels.

While it is good to see the nation's gasoline stockpiles rising, don't expect to see too much relief at the pump just yet. This past weekend we officially entered the high-demand summer driving months, which is sure to apply future upward pressure on prices. The recent record-high gasoline prices have been mostly a result of unusually low output from the nation's refineries and we still have not seen production really start to climb.

Despite the rise in gasoline reserves, oil inventories fell last week while analysts had expected a slight rise, but so far the market is giving more weight to the unexpected rise in gas. Oil inventories fell by 2 million barrels last week, while analysts had been planning to see an increase of around 300,000 barrels.

Continue reading Oil falls on gasoline inventory data

Oil stocks fall despite slightly rising oil

Posted Apr 18th 2007 5:04PM by Michael Fowlkes (RSS feed)
Filed under: Exxon Mobil (XOM), Chevron Corp (CVX), ConocoPhillips (COP), BP p.l.c. ADS (BP), Valero Energy (VLO), Oil

Oil stocks were mostly down a bit on the day despite the fact that oil traded slightly higher during the session. After this morning's inventory reports I would have expected to see prices trading higher, but traders had other ideas.

This morning we saw greater declines in both oil and gasoline inventories, but this was not enough to get the bulls to charge in and lift oil stocks. Crude oil inventories had been expected to climb by about a half million barrels but what we saw was a decline of 1 million barrels. Gasoline supplies had been expected to fall by 1.3 million barrels and they surprised traders by plummeting 2.7 million barrels.

With the much larger drops in inventory than had been expected we would typically expect to see a very strong day for oil prices. Today though, this was not the case and we saw oil prices rise, but only by $0.05 to $63.15.

So what was the main reason why today's inventories surprises were unable to give oil a price lift? Traders seemed to be looking ahead and expecting to see future gasoline inventories on the rise as the nations refineries showed a 2% rise in usage. Analysts had been expecting that refinery usage would increase by less than a half percent.

Continue reading Oil stocks fall despite slightly rising oil

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