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Click here for a replay our Hedgeye webcast on Wednesday afternoon with Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers.com in which we discussed major developments impacting global oil markets - including Wednesday's Reuters article about Aramco halting its IPO plans. Hedgeye’s senior energy policy analyst Joe McMonigle lead the call and discussion with Samir.
The first 30 minutes is some background on TankerTrackers and how they do their modeling and analysis. It has some quite interesting segments. The second 30 minutes of the call was a discussion about oil markets and hot topics.
Two big takeaways from the call:
1) EIA Weekly Petroleum Data Forecast - TankerTrackers.com does a day-ahead forecast of weekly EIA crude inventory reports that are issued on Wednesday mornings. Their forecast this week was for a draw of 5.660 million barrels and only off by 178,000 barrels. The EIA data number was a draw of 5.838 million barrels prompting oil prices to rise 3 percent on the news. Hedgeye clients get a free two week trial for a TankerTrackers.com subscription by using the code: "Hedgeye".
2) US sanctions on Iran oil exports – Bloomberg last week reported that Iranian crude exports were down by 700,000 b/d as a result of impending US sanctions that become effective in November. Based on their analysis, TankerTrackers disputed the Bloomberg number as inaccurate and faulted big media headlines that use automated data that relies on GPS tracking. TankerTrackers said the the Iranian tankers have been turning off GPS transponders ahead of US sanctions. While they did this in the past, it was only done at the site of import. Now, the transponder is being turned off for almost the entire shipment. Instead, TankerTrackers uses satellite imagery to track the non-GPS Iranian tankers and said Iran crude exports are unchanged. If so, 700,000 b/d is a big discrepancy for oil markets.
Other topics discussed include:
Saudi oil production in July – Saudi Arabia's assertion that it cut production in July to 10.29 million barrels per day (b/d) from June’s 10.49 million b/d came as a surprise since it telegraphed that it would lead the OPEC 1 million b/d production increase. The Saudis told reporters and analysts on background that production this summer would hit 10.8 million b/d. Meanwhile, Platts had Saudi July production at 10.63 million b/d and EIA had it at 10.6 million b/d. Even OPEC put Saudi production higher at 10.387 million b/d. The TankerTrackers number is closer to Platts/EIA at 10.589 and said an analysis of first 14 days of Saudi exports in August were trending similar to July.
US crude exports – The US now exports more crude than several OPEC members. In June, US crude exports hit a record 3 million b/d, and China receives about 20 percent of those barrels. TankerTrackers said US crude exports are crucial to compiling their forecasts for US weekly inventory data and are sometimes the determining factor.
TankerTrackers.com is an independent online subscription service that tracks and reports shipments and storage of crude oil in several geographical and geopolitical areas of interest. Partnering with leading satellite and maritime tracking technology companies, the firm is able to provide an analysis of ongoing events, maritime export reports, inventory/production forecasts, and satellite visuals wherever clandestine activity is taking place. TankerTrackers.com’s research provides oil traders, investors, journalists, scholars, enthusiasts and many more with a simple and digestible bird's eye view of what's going on in the world of oil.
