Diesel Prices Ran Into A Wall At The $3.80 Mark Thursday And Quickly Dropped By 16 Cents In An Emphatic Demonstration Of Technical Resistance
Diesel prices ran into a wall at the $3.80 mark Thursday, and quickly dropped by 16 cents in an emphatic demonstration of technical resistance, leaving the energy complex in its sideways trading range. RBOB initially followed that pattern, dropping more than a dime after hitting the top end of its trading range, but then the expiring August contract decoupled from the rest of the energy train and continued moving higher, and setting a new record premium vs the 2nd month contract.
Today is the last trading day for the August RBOB and ULSD contracts, and the lack of volume on expiration day is already causing fireworks that look impressive on the charts, but won’t matter to almost everyone who buys fuel, since the September contracts will determine tonight’s pricing moves. For example: As of 8am central, August RBOB prices are up 15 cents/gallon, but most cash markets are following the September RBOB contract which is “only” up 6.
The extreme backwardation in gasoline prices is not just showing up in the futures market. Prompt RBOB values in the NYH are trading some 40 cents above values for barrels delivered 2 weeks from now, and 68 cents higher than RBOB on the Gulf Coast as a short squeeze for summer gasoline grips parts of the East Coast, even while other parts of the country are having trouble finding buyers. This seems to be a less extreme example of what we saw in April and May when New York Harbor diesel prices spiked to premiums of $1.20/gallon or more compared to its neighboring cash markets. The forward pricing curve suggest that this spread will collapse in August, just as we saw diesel premiums collapse in May (see charts below).
One extra challenge for the East Coast, there were several forecasts when the war in Ukraine started that European refiners would run full out to make as much diesel as possible, and end up with excess gasoline to be sent to the US, but some of those facilities are now running well below capacity as soaring natural gas costs (and/or limited supply) make operations uneconomical for some and unfeasible for others. For those that remember last year’s freeze induced natural gas price spike and shortages that led to every refinery in Texas to cut operating rates, this scenario playing out in Europe is easy to understand, as is the potential fallout from the lack of output.
Right on cue, PBF announced it is bringing its idled crude unit in Paulsboro NJ back into operation after shutting it down to try and avoid bankruptcy during the depths of the COVID demand slump.
In other earnings news, Pemex announced that they made $862 million in EBITDA in the first 6 months of operations at the Deer Park refinery, which is $150 million more than they paid for their interest in the facility. Still no word from Shell if they’d like a do-over on any of the refineries they dumped in the past two years.
Valero joined most other refiners, smashing its records for profitability during the quarter, increasing run rates to 94% of capacity, up from 74% 2 years ago. The company also had record renewable diesel production, and expects its next RD expansion project to be completed by the end of the year. In a sign of the market’s skepticism over the forward outlook of fuel demand, the company’s stock dropped after the announcement even though earnings surpassed most published expectations.
The senate spending deal that surprised many this week has good news for biofuel producers in that the $1/gallon blenders tax credit is expected to be extended for another 2 years. One potentially painful mistake however is that the bill also includes a $1.25/gallon tax credit for sustainable aviation fuels, which means producers will get an extra 25 cents/gallon to make SAF instead of BIO or RD, which could heat up the feedstock wars once again and send fuel that had been used over the road for the past decade into the skies. The bill includes numerous other potential credits and incentives for both renewable and traditional fuel production, and capturing the carbon created by those projects.
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The Recovery Rally In Energy Markets Continues For A 3rd Day
The recovery rally in energy markets continues for a 3rd day with refined product futures both up more than a dime off of the multi-month lows we saw Wednesday morning. The DJIA broke 40,000 for the first time ever Thursday, and while it pulled back yesterday, US equity futures are suggesting the market will open north of that mark this morning, adding to the sends of optimism in the market.
Despite the bounce in the back half of the week, the weekly charts for both RBOB and ULSD are still painting a bearish outlook with a lower high and lower low set this week unless the early rally this morning can pick up steam in the afternoon. It does seem like the cycle of liquidation from hedge funds has ended however, so it would appear to be less likely that we’ll see another test of technical support near term after this bounce.
Ukraine hit another Russian refinery with a drone strike overnight, sparking a fire at Rosneft’s 240mb/day Tuapse facility on the black sea. That plant was one of the first to be struck by Ukrainian drones back in January and had just completed repairs from that strike in April. The attack was just one part of the largest drone attack to date on Russian energy infrastructure overnight, with more than 100 drones targeting power plants, fuel terminals and two different ports on the Black Sea. I guess that means Ukraine continues to politely ignore the White House request to stop blowing up energy infrastructure in Russia.
Elsewhere in the world where lots of things are being blown up: Several reports of a drone attack in Israel’s largest refining complex (just under 200kbd) made the rounds Thursday, although it remains unclear how much of that is propaganda by the attackers and if any impact was made on production.
The LA market had 2 different refinery upsets Thursday. Marathon reported an upset at the Carson section of its Los Angeles refinery in the morning (the Carson facility was combined with the Wilmington refinery in 2019 and now reports as a single unit to the state, but separately to the AQMD) and Chevron noted a “planned” flaring event Thursday afternoon. Diesel basis values in the region jumped 6 cents during the day. Chicago diesel basis also staged a recovery rally after differentials dropped past a 30 cent discount to futures earlier in the week, pushing wholesale values briefly below $2.10/gallon.
So far there haven’t been any reports of refinery disruptions from the severe weather than swept across the Houston area Thursday. Valero did report a weather-related upset at its Mckee refinery in the TX panhandle, although it appears they avoided having to take any units offline due to that event.
The Panama Canal Authority announced it was increasing its daily ship transit level to 31 from 24 as water levels in the region have recovered following more than a year of restrictions. That’s still lower than the 39 ships/day rate at the peak in 2021, but far better than the low of 18 ships per day that choked transit last year.
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Energy Prices Found A Temporary Floor After Hitting New Multi-Month Lows Wednesday
Energy prices found a temporary floor after hitting new multi-month lows Wednesday morning as a rally to record highs in US equity markets and a modestly bullish DOE report both seemed to encourage buyers to step back into the ring.
RBOB and ULSD futures both bounced more than 6 cents off of their morning lows, following a CPI report that eased inflation fears and boosted hopes for the stock market’s obsession of the FED cutting interest rates. Even though the correlation between energy prices and equities and currencies has been weak lately, the spillover effect on the bidding was clear from the timing of the moves Wednesday.
The DOE’s weekly report seemed to add to the optimism seen in equity markets as healthy increases in the government’s demand estimates kept product inventories from building despite increased refinery runs.
PADD 3 diesel stocks dropped after large increases in each of the past 3 weeks pushed inventories from the low end of their seasonal range to average levels. PADD 2 inventories remain well above average which helps explain the slump in mid-continent basis values over the past week. Diesel demand showed a nice recovery on the week and would actually be above the 5 year average if the 5% or so of US consumption that’s transitioned to RD was included in these figures.
Gasoline inventories are following typical seasonal patterns except on the West Coast where a surge in imports helped inventories recover for a 3rd straight week following April’s big basis rally.
Refiners for the most part are also following the seasonal script, ramping up output as we approach the peak driving demand season which unofficially kicks off in 10 days. PADD 2 refiners didn’t seem to be learning any lessons from last year’s basis collapse and rapidly increased run rates last week, which is another contributor to the weakness in midwestern cash markets. One difference this year for PADD 2 refiners is the new Transmountain pipeline system has eroded some of their buying advantage for Canadian crude grades, although those spreads so far haven’t shrunk as much as some had feared.
Meanwhile, wildfires are threatening Canada’s largest oil sands hub Ft. McMurray Alberta, and more than 6,000 people have been forced to evacuate the area. So far no production disruptions have been reported, but you may recall that fires in this region shut in more than 1 million barrels/day of production in 2016, which helped oil prices recover from their slump below $30/barrel.
California’s Air Resources Board announced it was indefinitely delaying its latest California Carbon Allowance (CCA) auction – in the middle of the auction - due to technical difficulties, with no word yet from the agency when bidders’ security payments will be returned, which is pretty much a nice microcosm for the entire Cap & Trade program those credits enable.