price spreads

Over the past three-plus years, Corpus Christi has dominated the U.S. crude oil export market, largely because of the availability of straight-shot pipeline access from the Permian to two Corpus-area terminals at Ingleside — Enbridge Ingleside Energy Center (EIEC) and South Texas Gateway (STG) — that can partially load the huge 2-MMbbl VLCCs (Very Large Crude Carriers). But capacity on the pipes to Corpus is now nearly maxed out and, with Permian production rising and exports strong, an increasing share of West Texas crude output is instead being sent to Houston on pipelines with capacity to spare. The catch for Permian shippers with capacity on Permian-to-Houston pipes is that the Midland-to-MEH (Magellan East Houston) price differential for WTI has been depressingly low —$0.22/bbl on average this year, compared to almost $20/bbl for a few months in 2018 and averaging $5.50/bbl as recently as 2019. However, the Midland-to-MEH WTI price spread looks to be on the verge of a rebound of sorts, as we discuss in today’s RBN blog.

Not long ago, the economics for U.S. LNG exports were practically a no-brainer. Despite the longer voyage times and the resulting higher shipping costs from Gulf Coast and East Coast ports to Europe and Asia — by far the biggest LNG consuming regions — LNG priced at the U.S.’s Henry Hub gas benchmark presented a competitive alternative to other global LNG supply, much of which is indexed to oil prices, which were higher then. But earlier this year, as oil prices collapsed, COVID-19 lockdowns decimated worldwide gas demand, and international gas prices plummeted, the decision to lift U.S. cargoes has become much more nuanced, and the commercial agreements to support the development of new liquefaction capacity are much harder — if not impossible — to come by. Today, we discuss highlights from RBN’s latest Drill Down Report on the impact of recent market events on U.S. export demand, capacity utilization, and new project development.

In observance of today’s holiday, we’ve given our writers a break and are revisiting a recently published blog on the U.S.’s shifting role in the global LNG market. If you didn’t read it then, this is your opportunity to see what you missed! Happy Labor Day!

Not long ago, the economics for U.S. LNG exports were practically a no-brainer. Despite the longer voyage times and the resulting higher shipping costs from Gulf Coast and East Coast ports to Europe and Asia — by far the biggest LNG consuming regions — LNG priced at the U.S.’s Henry Hub gas benchmark presented a competitive alternative to other global LNG supply, much of which is indexed to oil prices, which were higher then. But earlier this year, as oil prices collapsed, COVID-19 lockdowns decimated worldwide gas demand, and international gas prices plummeted, the decision to lift U.S. cargoes has become much more nuanced, and the commercial agreements to support the development of new liquefaction capacity are much harder — if not impossible — to come by. Today, we discuss highlights from RBN’s latest Drill Down Report on the impact of recent market events on U.S. export demand, capacity utilization, and new project development.

Cancellations of U.S. LNG cargoes are starting to take a toll on Lower-48 natural gas demand. Feedgas flows to U.S. terminals last week fell to as low as 5.76 Bcf/d, down from the daily peaks above 9 Bcf/d seen as recently as April and the lowest since October 2019. While some of the slowdown may be attributable to domestic outages or maintenance on feeder pipes — or short-lived marine channel weather conditions — the bulk of it is a precursor to the first big round of cancellations by offtakers for June liftings. This, as COVID-related demand destruction and the resulting supply glut in the past month have collapsed what already were weak economics for exporting U.S. LNG to Europe and Asia, wiping out offtakers’ margins for delivery into those markets. Nevertheless, many cargoes will continue to move. What drives offtakers’ decision of whether to lift or cancel cargoes? Today, we wrap up a short series looking at the market and logistical dynamics forcing cancellations, as well as some of the mitigating factors that could prop up cargo liftings more than you’d expect in the current environment.

The crash in global crude oil markets has meant low prices for all producers, but no place more so than in Alberta’s oil sands. Transportation, blending and quality differentials mean that benchmark Western Canadian Select (WCS) is priced at a significant discount to light, sweet West Texas Intermediate. With WTI prices seemingly stuck below $30/bbl, the absolute price of WCS last week tumbled to all-time lows below $5/bbl. If they persist, will WCS prices south of $10/bbl generate wide-scale production shut-ins in the oil sands? Today, we continue our series on the challenges facing Alberta’s oil sands.

The collapse in WTI prices in March has been a crushing blow to the Permian, the Bakken and other U.S. shale plays that produce light, sweet crude oil. But as bad as sub-$25/bbl WTI prices are — especially for producers whose balance-of-2020 volumes aren’t at least partly hedged at higher prices — consider the record-low, $5/bbl prices facing oil sands producers up north in Alberta. Western Canadian Select, the energy-rich region’s benchmark heavy-crude blend, fell below $10/bbl more than a week ago, and on Tuesday WCS closed at $5.08/bbl. Producers, who already had been dealing with major takeaway constraints, are ratcheting back their output and planned 2020 capex, and slashing the volumes they send out via rail in tank cars. Today, we begin a short blog series on the latest round of bad news hitting Western Canada’s oil patch.

For much of the 2010s, the U.S. midstream sector has been on a development spree. New or expanded everything — pipelines, gas processing plants, fractionators, storage facilities, liquefaction trains, export terminals and more — all to keep pace with the production gains of the Shale Era. But now, at the start of the 2020s, the build-out frenzy appears to be fizzling and flickering. Midstreamers’ capital spending plans are on the decline, at least for now, as most of the infrastructure needed to handle current and expected volumes for the next few years is either in place or under construction. But that doesn’t mean things won’t stay interesting — far from it. This new decade brings with it a period of midstream-sector strategizing and portfolio rejiggering. Today, we discuss highlights from East Daley Capital’s newly released “Dirty Little Secrets” report about the next phase of midstream strategy.

The Permian Basin is awash in light, sweet crude oil that’s cheap to produce and easy to process. It’s so awash, in fact, that supplies are overwhelming takeaway pipeline capacity. The resulting bottleneck in West Texas has cratered prices in Midland, where West Texas Intermediate (WTI) — the region’s light, sweet benchmark — has blown out price-wise against the same grade in other locations, including Houston, with its crude-export docks. Less well known, but influential beyond its geography, is Midland West Texas Sour, or WTS. WTS is suffering from the same wide differentials as WTI at Midland, and those yawning spreads are dragging down the price of Maya, Pemex’s flagship heavy, sour crude. Today, we discuss some surprising ripple effects of takeaway constraints out of the Permian.