On Day 2 of RBN and Novi’s School of Energy in Houston, Novi Vice President of North American Energy Markets David Braziel spoke with Phillips 66 Vice President of Investor Relations and Chief Economist Sean Maher for a candid conversation about global developments reshaping U.S. energy markets.
During Thursday’s conversation, they examined recent geopolitical disruptions and their implications for energy prices, supply security and U.S. market dynamics.
“What the closure of the Strait did is force the rest of the world, and the U.S. in particular, to look towards energy security in their own markets,” Maher said.
Maher said that the closure of the Strait has shown the relative cost advantage of U.S. energy, reinforcing the attractiveness of U.S. supply to global buyers.. “the world continues to seek reliable, competitively priced energy, and the U.S. is well positioned to help meet that demand.” he added.
Asked which leading indicators he follows, Maher acknowledged major geopolitical shocks can sharply disrupt markets. Still, he stressed that analysis should return to the underlying drivers of energy demand and supply after periods of extreme price volatility.
“There’s always some reversion to the mean when you have massive dislocations of price … so you have to ground yourself on the fundamentals.”
Those fundamentals include economic and population growth, as well as the outlook for long-term energy demand. “What is the economic outlook of the global marketplace and what does that trend?” he said, adding that policy and regulatory developments are among the factors that can influence that trajectory.
