Unstable stability

摘要

Oil markets fell only slightly as a drop in demand in Asia-Pacifc was mostly ofset by the impact of rapidly sliding global inventories. Atlantic basin benchmark North Sea Dated declined by 73￠/bl to settle at $54.99/bl on 28 January, while March deliveries of US benchmark WTI fell by 79￠/bl to $52.34/bl. Global oil markets have achieved a measure of stability this month, trading in a relatively tight band of $54-56/bl-or $50-53/bl for WTI-since Saudi Arabia announced an extra 1mn b/d cut for February-March on 5 January. Opec+ output cuts and stagnant US production-in the face of a rally that has pushed prices past breakeven costs in many shale regions-are speeding up the drawdown of crude stocks. All three major global crude benchmarks are now in backwardation, with a prompt supply defcit pushing the spot price above second-month markets and giving the signal to pull crude from storage. US crude invento-ries fell by nearly 10mn bl in the week to 22 January, the EIA reports-the largest weekly decline since July. Stocks at the WTI futures delivery point in Cushing fell by 2.3mn bl, and are now more than 15mn bl below their 2020 peak in early May.