Flat price catching its breath
- Brent pulling back a little after $6/Bbl rally already this week.
- WTI October and November exports still not viable to NWE or Far East, SE Asian Suez arb close to being workable. October Murban cargos are now reported as ‘sold out’.
- Expecting an increase of WTI Exports to NWE in September which would weigh on Sep DFL. Weakness in Sep may be a buying opportunity for Oct or Nov DFL
- Dec WTI/Brent has widened out to -$6.60/Bbl, trending the right direction but still not wide enough to open arbs to Europe.
- Nov Brent Dubai EFS trending higher making it harder for Atlantic Basin barrels to head to Asia.
- We continue to hold positions in long Oct/Nov CL (although near profit taking level), short Nov WTI/Brent, and long Q4 Mars basis (although near profit taking level).
(Dubai needs to strengthen relative to Brent for Asian markets to attract Atlantic Basin Exports)
(WTI needs to weaken relative to Brent to encourage WTI to NWE Exports)
About the Author
Aaron Kildow | Crude Commodity Owner, Sparta Commodities
Aaron is Sparta’s Commodity Owner for crude, covering physical and financial oil markets, hedging structures, and customised oil balances. He co-founded The Oil Balance and spent over a decade at Macquarie Group building supply/demand models for Cushing, PADD 1, and PADD 3, with earlier trading and derivatives roles at CHS, Musket Corp., and Prudential Financial.
Connect: LinkedIn
About Sparta
Founded in 2020, Sparta made waves in the commodity analytics space in March 2022 when it secured a $6m series A investment from Singular. This success then later snowballed into a further $17.5 million in a series A funding round led by the technology venture capital firm FirstMark, with participation from existing shareholder, Singular.
The platform, created by former traders Miles Moseley and Felipe Elink Schuurman, is designed to answer a common problem shared by most traders: 90% of pricing data required to make trading decisions is kept in silos and shared manually by voice, email, or chat.
Sparta breaks these existing data silos and combines the physical and paper markets to provide traders with live access to global raw prices, from futures and swaps to forward freight and physical premiums. We work with clients globally, including Philips 66, Chevron, Trafigura, Equinor and more.
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