BusinessDay 25 Oct 2017

Wednesday 25 October 2017
C002D5556
BUSINESS DAY
WEST AFRICA ENERGY
oil gas power
R
analysis
Breaking down the
Sea Trucks Group-WAV
conundrum
Page 5
Finance People
Appointments
L-R: Gaius Jackson-Obaseki (pioneer president/ member advisory board, NGA); Maikanti Baru (GMD-NNPC/chairman, advisory board of NGA);
Dada Thomas (president, NGA and Charles Osezua (past president /advisory board member of NGA) at the “Night With Maikanti Baru” and
Inauguration of Nigerian Gas Association Advisory Board held in Lagos recently
Stakeholders to discuss
strategy to deepen
local content at PNC
confab
Page 6
OPEC weekly basket price
DAY
PRICE
20/10/17 55.72
13/10/17 54.41
6/10/17 54.38
29/09/17 55.78
22/09/17 54.22
Source: OPEC
Debrief
Despite traction, oil prices still
enmeshed in uncertainty
FRANK UZUEGBUNAM
Oil prices have been
on the rebound in
recent times. West
Texas Intermediate’s
(WTI) 50-day
moving average rose above
the 200-day one, a bullish signal
known as a golden cross.
Growth in consumption has
been stronger than expected
this year, helping the recent
price gain, but the speed of the
expansion in US output has also
proved hard to predict.
In the past three years, as US
shale production ebbed and
flowed, the Organization of Petroleum
Exporting Countries
(OPEC) made historic shifts in
above $60,” Jeremy Weir, chief
executive officer of Trafigura,
said at the Oil & Money conference
in London.
Torbjoern Toernqvist, Gunvor
CEO said he is cautiously
optimistic about the oil market
for the year ahead. OPEC
will probably sustain its production
cuts for at least another
six months because
Russia and Saudi Arabia have
shown they will do what is
necessary.
The market has certainly
tightened up in the last few
months, said Ian Taylor, Vitol
CEO but US shale producers
still have the ability to drive
down prices, just as they did
back in 2014.
The disagreement between
Glencore, Gunvor and Trafigproduction
policy.
WTI crude for November
2017 delivery rose 18 cents to
settle at $51.47 a barrel. Total
volume was about 23 percent
below the 100-day average.
The more-actively traded
December contract added 33
cents to end the session at
$51.84. Brent for December
settlement climbed 52 cents
to settle at $57.75 a barrel.
The global benchmark crude
traded at a premium of $5.91
to December WTI.
Despite the traction, oil prices
are still enmeshed in huge
uncertainty. The world’s biggest
oil traders say crude oil prices
could rise above $60 a barrel in
a year or it might fall to $45.
“Towards the back end of
next year we are going to be well
ura on the bullish side, and
Vitol Group on the other, underscores
the huge uncertainty
over the key drivers of oil supply
and demand.
The International Energy
Agency (IEA) has increased its
estimate for 2017 oil demand
growth in each of the past four
months, now predicting the
strongest expansion in two
years. OPEC disagrees, forecasting
internally that the inventory
surplus will finally clear
by the third quarter of 2018. The
big difference in their outlooks
comes down to the strength of
supply from outside the producer
group. The IEA sees an
extra 1.5 million barrels a day of
non-OPEC oil production next
year, 600,000 above OPEC’s estimate.