British Petroleum or BP (NYSE:BP) as it is also known, is having the wind taken out of its sails as investors say enough is enough when it comes to investing and losing money in aspirational virtue signaling projects.
Reuters reported that BP’s CEO Murray Auchincloss has imposed a hiring freeze and paused new offshore wind projects as he places a renewed emphasis on oil and gas amid investor discontent over its energy transition strategy, sources at the company said.
The moves, which have not previously been reported, are part of a decision by Auchincloss to slow down investments in big-budget, low-carbon projects, particularly in offshore wind, that are not expected to generate cash for years, said several sources at BP who declined to be named according to Reuters. This means that investors are demanding that BP get back to investing, get back to oil and gas and start making profits. This is the latest evidence of the backlash from the energy transition debacle that has damaged the global economy, led to rampant inflation, hurt the poor, and destabilized the globe. Finally, we are starting to see a swing back towards common sense as people of reason start to stand up.
Despite global leaders falsely claiming that the biggest threat to the globe is climate change, people of reason see that the cure being touted by the green energy elite is much worse than the disease. For years politicians and global leaders have hyped doom and gloom climate predictions to push the big government green agenda. Doom and gloom predictions to get you to conform, and give up your freedoms all in the good name of saving a planet. Whether it’s taking away your mode of transportation or putting farmers out of business by trying to take away their water supply or get rid of gassy cows and take away your meat or taxing the heck out of you, it is more about government control. These policies will make it almost impossible to heat or cool your home; people are starting to get wise to this game. They are getting tired of these political windbags.
Decades of this scaremongering and billions of dollars spent on this transition yet the reality is that fossil fuel usage is at a record high. I am for all forms of energy yet it’s very clear the government's desire is to force-feed the global economy with inefficient energy sources that are more expensive and take away our rights. Not only has it failed from a carbon emission standpoint but from a moral and ethical standpoint as well.
Back in the real oil world, prices seem to be shaking off some bearish data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) and even reports China’s crude oil imports hitting a five-year low because of increasing geo-political risk and signs that the trend of increasing global demand that will hit an all-time high, will see the oil market significantly tighten later over the coming months.
The EIA put supply at U.S. commercial crude oil inventories (excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) increased by 3.6 million barrels from the previous week. At 460.7 million barrels, {{8849|U.S. crcrude oil inventories are about 2% below the five-year average for this time of year. Total motor gasoline inventories increased by 2.7 million barrels from last week and the same as the five-year average for this time of year. Distillate fuel inventories decreased by 0.4 million barrels last week and are about 9% below the five-year average for this time of year.
The EIA petroleum demand over the four-week moving average came in at about 20.4 million barrels a day and that’s actually up 0.8% from the same period last year gasoline demand continues to lag falling last week and on a four-week moving average is at 9.1 million barrels a day down 2% from the same. A year ago, distillate demand came in at 3.6 million barrels a day over the past four weeks, which is down 1% from the same period a year ago.
Other fuels are driving the market higher, jet fuel, asphalt chemicals and demand is higher than a year ago overall.
Natural gas can’t seem to get a handle on which way the wind is blowing. While production is down and demand is up, some producers might start to ramp up production and temperatures could cool down, causing some uncertainty about advancing prices much higher. On top of that the hot weather that has driven demand in many parts of the country may ease and the other issue with natural gas is just what may happen as far as tropical activity develops in the Gulf of Mexico.
Fox Weather is reporting that, “Hurricane HQ: Invest 95L likely to become Tropical Storm Beryl in Atlantic Fox Weather warns that a pair of tropical disturbances are being tracked in the Atlantic Ocean.
‘Invest 94L is the one closest to land as it moves across the Caribbean Sea. Invest 95L is in the middle of the ocean and has a high chance of developing into a tropical depression or tropical storm this weekend. The next named storm in the Atlantic will receive the name Beryl.
For natural gas these storms, depending on how they develop, could have a major impact on prices, whether it be from the lack of production because of shutdowns in the Gulf of Mexico to the flip side of that power outages caused by this storm reducing demand. Download the Fox Weather app to keep up with the latest developments.
The other thing that natural gas traders are watching today is the weekly storage report. Scott Di Salvino at Reuters wrote that, “U.S. utilities likely added a smaller-than-usual 51 billion cubic feet (bcf) of natural gas into storage last week, after drillers cut output earlier this year due to low gas prices, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday. That would be sharply down from an injection of 81 bcf during the same week a year ago and a five-year (2019-2023) average increase of 85 bcf for this time of year. In the prior week ended June 14, utilities added 71 bcf of gas into storage. The forecast for the week ended June 21 would increase stockpiles to 3.096 trillion cubic feet (tcf), about 11.2% above the same week a year ago and about 20.5% above the five-year average for the week. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) will release its weekly storage report at 10:30 a.m. EDT (1430 GMT) on Thursday. Financial firm LSEG said gas output in the Lower 48 U.S. states rose to an average of 98.5 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) so far in June, up from a 25-month low of 98.1 bcfd in May. That was still well below the monthly record high of 105.5 bcfd from December 2023.
There were 94 total degree days (TDDs) last week compared with a 30-year normal of 75 for the period, according to data from financial firm LSEG. TDDs measure the number of degrees a day’s average temperature is above or below 65 degrees Fahrenheit (18 degrees Celsius) to estimate demand to cool or heat homes and businesses.