Oil Prices Continue to Drop
In the last 5 weeks, since August 7, oil prices, both for crude oil and petroleum products, have dropped substantially. The price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil has fallen from $77 per barrel to below $64 per barrel. Retail gasoline prices have dropped 42 cents per gallon to $2.62 as of September 11, while retail diesel fuel prices, at $2.86 per gallon, are now about 20 cents per gallon lower than they were 5 weeks ago. Will the declines continue, or will they begin to level off and possibly increase later this year?
For crude oil markets, the global situation is about as rosy as has been the case in the last several months. Almost every concern that existed in crude oil markets this summer is much more benign now. Concerns about a possible oil disruption from Iran have faded, as the diplomatic push to get Iran to halt enrichment of nuclear material has not yet led to sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council, and Iran has stated recently its willingness to continue negotiations with the United Nations. Mid-September has arrived without a single hurricane affecting oil facilities in the Gulf of Mexico and with no storms likely to arrive within at least the next week. Nigeria, where significant disruptions have occurred with some frequency over the past several years, has been quiet. The oil situation in Iraq is as positive as it has been in nearly 2 years, with EIA estimating Iraqi crude oil production in July and August at its highest levels since the fall of 2004. Even the one disruption that did make news recently, the BP pipeline leak in Alaska, now appears to be much less of a problem than originally thought. Initially, concerns were raised that Prudhoe Bay production might be stopped altogether, but it was soon determined that only a part of production would have to be taken offline for an extended period. According to the State of Alaska, Prudhoe Bay production for the month of August averaged 189 thousand barrels per day, which is about half of its August 2005 level. BP recently announced plans to begin to bring more production online soon and hopes to have full production restored by the end of October.
For gasoline markets, the price drop that normally arrives after Labor Day and usually extends through the end of the year began a few weeks early, as the market entered the last few weeks of August with no hurricanes threatening petroleum infrastructure, such as refineries or pipelines, and with enough supplies on hand to get through Labor Day. As a result, the sell-off started before Labor Day, as along with the expected seasonal demand drop, rising refinery runs, and high import levels, markets perceived an improving supply/demand balance, pushing down prices. Currently, the near-month futures price of a barrel of gasoline is only $1 to $2 above that of a barrel of crude oil, an unusually low margin that is likely to increase over the coming months. Diesel prices have not dropped as much as gasoline, mostly because diesel demand tends to be strong in the fall with agricultural use of diesel increasing as crops are harvested, and the similarity of diesel to heating oil often causes diesel prices to rise in conjunction with heating oil as the winter approaches. Thus, declines in diesel prices have been limited to those caused by the decline in crude oil prices.
Unless the U.S. economy starts showing signs of a significant slowdown, which would slow oil demand growth, or an unusually warm winter in the northern hemisphere that depresses heating-related demand, the opportunity for further improvement in crude oil markets appears to be limited. The global balance is expected to remain relatively tight as long as global demand continues to increase at a faster pace than non-OPEC supply, limiting gains in global spare production capacity, which implies that the downward trend in prices is likely to stop or reverse if one of the many potential sources of supply trouble flares up or if product pressures from heating fuels pulls up crude oil prices once cold weather begins in earnest. Regardless of what the future holds, U.S. consumers can take some comfort from the fact that U.S. average regular gasoline prices have dropped sharply over the last five weeks, and that crude oil prices are as low as they have been in several months.
