Tag: Yemen

Best in Energy – 16 March 2023

Climate target of 1.5°C called in doubt ($FT)

Credit Suisse gets lifeline from central bank

Banks as privately-owned state agents ($FT)

Exxon ramps up new crude distillation unit

Iran/Saudi deal to end arming Yemen ($WSJ)

If you are interested in banking supervision and financial failures, I can strongly recommend “Integrity, Fairness and Resolve”, a short monograph published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City about the savings and loan crisis of the 1980s. “Belly Up: The Collapse of the Penn Square Bank” also comes with my highest recommendation for a combination of insight and dark humour.

OIL PRICES fell sharply on March 15 in response to growing fears about a banking crisis and its impact on the economy. Brent futures were pushed bellow the bottom of the recent trading range:

U.S. DISTILLATE fuel oil inventories amounted to 120 million barrels on March 10. Inventories were -13 million barrels (-10% or -0.81 standard deviations) below the prior ten-year average. But the deficit has narrowed from -21 million barrels (-16% or -1.62 standard deviations) at the start of 2023 and -31 million barrels (-22% or -2.05 standard deviations) on October 7, 2022:

Best in Energy – 10 March 2023

U.S. Treasury reassures traders on sanctions ($FT)

Russia’s missiles target Ukraine’s energy networks

India to boost LNG imports for generators ($BBG)

U.S. central bank discovers r* is unreliable indicator

U.S. yield curve inversion and equity values ($WSJ)

U.S. economy and supply-driven inflation ($WSJ)

U.S. inflation fuelled by margin expansion ($BBG)

U.S./EU downplay race on energy subsidies ($FT)

EU eases state aid rules to match U.S. subsidies

(see also European Commission press release)

U.S. railroad safety and trackside sensors ($WSJ)

Yemen’s decaying oil storage tanker to be unloaded

U.S. TREAURY YIELD curve between two-year and ten-year maturities has inverted to around 100 basis points, the most extreme since August 1981, when the economy was entering the second part of the double-dip recession of the early 1980s. The inversion is signalling a sharp fall in interest rates, resulting from a rapid deceleration of inflation, a downturn  in the business cycle, or a combination of both:

U.S. GAS INVENTORIES are moving into an increasing surplus, keeping downward pressure on prices. Stocks were +240 billion cubic feet (+13% or +0.58 standard deviations) above the prior ten-year seasonal average on March 3, up from a deficit of -263 billion cubic feet (-8% or -0.98 standard deviations) on January 1, 2023, and a deficit of -427 billion cubic feet (-13% or -1.52 standard deviations) on September 9, 2022:

Best in Energy – 28 February 2023

Russia’s oil export revenue and sanctions impact

Japan’s opposition to nuclear power falls ($BBG)

BP transfers statistical review to new publisher

Lithium prices tumble as bubble bursts

China’s pensions and population ageing

Yemen’s stricken oil storage tanker ($FT)

GLOBAL INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION was essentially flat in December 2022 compared with December 2021, as output deteriorated through the latter part of 2022 in response to rising inflation, faltering consumer and business purchases of merchandise, and efforts to reduce excess inventories. Output growth has slowed to rates consistent with the onset of recessions in 2001, 2008 and 2020, though also with mid-cycle slowdowns in 2012 and 2015 from which the economy re-accelerated: